Homily for the Solemnity of Sts. Peter and Paul

The church is not just the place we come to, it is the place from which we are sent forth. We need both, Peter and Paul. Peter, the Rock, who centers us and grounds us in faith; and Paul, the missionary, who calls us to go out to live the good news with our lives.

I have Mass on Sunday, June 29 at St. Isidore @ 9:30/11:30 am

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Transcript

A reading from the Holy Gospel According to Matthew. 

When Jesus went into the region of Caesarea Philippi, he asked his disciples, "Who do people say that the Son of Man is?" They replied, "Some say John the Baptist, others Eliah, still others Jeremiah or one of the prophets." He said to them, "But who do you say that I am?" 

And Peter said in reply, "You are the Christ, the Son of the living God." Jesus said to him in reply, "Blessed are you, Simon, Son of Jonah, for flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my heavenly Father. And so I say to you, you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it.

I will give you the keys to the kingdom of heaven. Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven, and whatever you loosed on earth shall be loosed in heaven." 

The Gospel of the Lord 

There is a line in St. Luke's Passion Gospel that gives us an insight into Sts. Peter and Paul. Jesus said, "Simon, Simon, listen. Satan has demanded his sift all of you like wheat, but I prayed for you that your own faith may not fail, and you, when once you have turned back, strengthen your brothers." Once you have turned back, once you have been converted, had a change of heart, a change of direction." 

St. Paul has such a moment on the Damascus Road as Paul writes in the letter to the Galatians, "For you heard of my former way of life in Judaism, how I persecuted the church of God beyond measure and tried to destroy it. But God called me through His grace to reveal His son to me so that I might proclaim Him to the Gentiles." 

What ultimately unites these two deeply faithful, deeply flawed followers of Jesus is their weakness, not their strength. What Paul calls strength being made perfect in weakness. God's grace broke their hearts open for one another and for so many other broken followers of Jesus. 

Paul is first reminding himself when he writes to the church in Corinth, "Love is patient, love is kind, love is not envious or boastful or arrogant or rude. It does not insist on its own way. It does not rejoice in wrongdoing but rejoices in the truth. It bears all things, believes all things, hopes all things, endures all things." 

Once you have turned back, it is not a one and done. It's a lifelong process. 

In today's first reading, we meet Peter in chains. The next day he will stand before Herod and most likely be condemned to death. But the angel of the Lord stood by him. The chains fall from his wrist. God comes to set us free from all that holds us bound. 

We know this story. God brought the children of Israel out of slavery in Egypt and brought them to a land of promise. God is still liberating us today. The Hebrew word for Egypt is "mitra'im." "Mitzra'im" isn't just a place on the map. It means a narrow place, a place of limitation, a place of confinement. "Mitzra'im" is a condition of the heart. So when God leads the Israelites out of "mitzra'im," God is not just freeing them from a political oppressor. God is leading them out of narrowness, out of smallness, out of anything that keeps them from being fully alive. 

In today's Gospel, Jesus gives Peter the keys to the kingdom, the power to bind and loose, to open and shut. But just as God did at the Red Sea, God always opens a way where there seems to be no way. This is what happens to Peter over and over. 

In chapter 10 of Matthew's Gospel, Jesus sent the disciples out on mission. Go nowhere among the Gentiles, but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. At the end of Matthew's Gospel, we hear different instructions. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, that is, the Gentiles. So the mission in the time of Jesus is changed in the time of the Church. Peter is struggling to be faithful to the tradition while at the same time trying to keep up with a God who goes ahead of him. 

In chapter 10 of the Acts of the Apostles, Peter is in Jaffa, on the roof waiting for lunch when he falls into a trance. In a dream, a sheet is lowered filled with clean and unclean animals. A voice tells Peter, "Take and eat." Peter replies, "Nothing unclean has ever touched my lips." Three times this vision is repeated, and each time the voice says to Peter, "What God has made clean, you must not call profane." 

Peter wakes up and is trying to figure out what all this means when some people arrive from the house of Cornelius, a Gentile, asking for Peter. Peter follows them as he realizes that he is being led by the Holy Spirit. At the house, Peter declares, "God has shown me to call no human profane or unclean." When Peter sees that the Holy Spirit has come upon Cornelius and his household, he goes even further. "I am beginning to understand that God shows no partiality, but in every nation anyone who fears God and does what is right is acceptable to him." 

James Alison says, "This is the first infallible papal decree." With that, Peter opens heaven to the Gentiles. This is the proper exercise of the Petrine power of the keys, opening a way where there was no way." 

In "The Joy of the Gospel," Pope Francis wrote, "The Word of God constantly shows us how God challenges those who believe in Him to go forth." The Church is not just the place we come to, it's the place from which we are sent forth. We need both, Peter and Paul. Peter, the rock who centers us and grounds us in faith, and Paul, the missionary who calls us to go out to live the good news with our lives.