Fri 29th June 2007SS PETER & PAUL App

Fr Julian Browning

Acts  12  :  1 – 11 ; II  Timothy  4  :  6 – 8  &  17 – 18 ; Matthew  16  :  13 – 19

You are Peter, and on this rock I will build my church.    Matthew 16.18   

Our unworthiness, our fickle behaviour, our periodic denials of God's existence, are no barrier to the grace of God, who opens still heaven to our gaze, giving us the strength, the power to do his work.

You would have thought that the authorities would give to Peter and to Paul their own separate special day, rather than this double act. There are several other feasts, the Conversion of St.Paul, the Chair of St.Peter, St.Peter's Chains, but they do not have the impact of this great feast day, a feast day about the Church, a feast day around which the ordinations to the priesthood cluster.

The two saints are joined together for ever largely through a historical error. Peter and Paul were martyred in Rome under Nero within a few years of each other in the late 60's AD. The veneration of saints in the early church began with celebrating the deaths of the saints because these were seen as their birthdays into eternal life. The tradition grew up that Peter and Paul had died together, when what is much more likely is that the bones were moved, the relics were translated, at about the same time. The fact is that we know very little, and what we don't know we often make up. But everyone was sure about the bones. Rome had the bones, and them bones meant power in those days, and so grew the the medieval ideas about apostolic succession and a direct line to the Almighty, and more than a little Anglo-Catholic agonizing.

That's the history. What was in Jesus's mind when He said: You are Peter and on this rock I will build my church? The disciple's name was Simon, and he was given a new name, Cephas, a rock, of Greek petros, rock. Peter is usually first on the list of disciples. He asks the questions, to which Jesus answers with the Gospel. Peter takes the lead. In St.John's Gospel he is the first to enter the sepulchre, the first to see that the body is not there. He is the leader, but he is always part of the group. When Peter says, You are the Christ, the Son of the living God, Peter is the first to express what the group of disciples is going to believe. He confesses, in the name of all Christians, who Jesus really is. He proclaims the faith on which the Church of God is to be constructed. You are the Christ. It was a personal relevation, it was blurted out, it was an involuntary reaction to what he had seen and heard. And yet on that rush of words, the Church of God is to be built. Then, in Caesarea Philippi, and now, in your life and mine. I don't think we are really here tonight because it's a holy day of obligation. We are here because at some point in our lives, maybe now almost forgotten, we decided to trust the vision of the beyond, that the truth is beyond what we see, and that when we see Jesus we see the Son of God. We probably don't know what we mean by it, but we dimly sense that flesh and blood has not revealed this to us, but our Father who is in Heaven. It's not something we've learnt, it's something we've been given. Yet it is on this mumbled unformed confession of faith that the church will be built today, or not at all. So Peter spoke on behalf of a group, on behalf of the disciples, and on behalf of us, this little group here today.

It gets better. To Peter is to be given the keys of the kingdom of heaven. It's all so odd, because one of the great story lines of the Gospel is Peter's unworthiness, his inability to understand, his unreliability, his betrayal of Jesus, and that dreadful denial: I know not the man you speak of. Gospel truth is often revealed by a contrast. The disciple who was the first to proclaim Jesus as the Christ is also the one who says he doesn't know him at all. But it isn't just Peter doing this; this is what we do, constantly, turn away, deny, we're fine on our own, I know not the man you speak of. Peter speaks yet once more for the disciples, for the group, and for us, just as he did in his confession of faith. We have a breaking point, a point, a point when flesh and blood are too strong,  when the vision seems have faded for ever. What really went through Peter's mind when he was taken out to be crucified? We daren't go there. Legend can sometimes help. Quo Vadis? Is the story of St.Peter fleeing the Roman persecution and meeting Our Lord on the Appian Way. Where are you going, says St. Peter. Jesus replies, I am going to be crucified again. So St Peter turns back to be martyred, making up for his earlier denial. The theme of Peter's unworthiness is maintained to the end, as it probably will be in our lives too. Yet to someone like that is given the keys to the kingdom of heaven. Surely there is hope for us. Our unworthiness, our fickle behaviour, our periodic denials of God's existence, are no barrier to the grace of God, who opens still heaven to our gaze, giving us the strength, the power to do his work.

In St. Paul's life and ministry there are similar contrasts; there is the persecution of Christians and there is his conversion. One reason why Peter and Paul are stuck with each other today is because between them they cover the world. Peter's mission was to the Church of the Jews; Paul's mission was to the Church of the Gentiles. So it is a truly catholic, worldwide feast today. It is a feast about all of us. And it is entirely right for this to be the time for ordinations, for the commissioning of those who are to make confession of faith in today' world, and who will help others to make the confession of faith for themselves, the confession we can all make today, notwithstanding our unworthiness and our many denials, that “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God”.