Solemnity of Saints Peter and Paul
Acts 12.1-11, Psalm 33, 2 Timothy 4.6-8, 17-18, Matthew 16.13-19
Cephas, Petrus, Peter ... Rocky? With a nickname like that, it's hard to believe that Simon Bar Jonah was other than well-built, as befitted his profession. But what was Jesus thinking of when he gave him that name? Was it the physical build, or the sometimes blundering enthusiasm? Or was it a quality of leadership which the Lord had already detected, a quality which made him the spokesman of the group both here at Caesarea Philippi and later in Jerusalem after Pentecost?
`You are Rocky and on this Rock I shall build my ekklésia' (the in-gathering of the children of Israel, the people of the New Covenant), says Jesus. But his words are a reply to Peter's own confession: `You are the Christ.' The foundation of the new community is not to be a strongman but a strong faith in the Son of the living God. Jesus and Peter are linked by a relationship of Lord and disciple, certainly; but also by love and friendship - the affection that could sum up this tempestuous beefcake of a man in one word, `Rocky'; the love that would in the end forgive Peter's betrayal. It's not because of the power of Peter's personality that the gates of the underworld can never hold out. It's because he places his trust in Christ, the cornerstone.
Just like Sylvester Stallone's character, our Rocky, Simon Peter, never had a quiet life. Neither, for that matter, did Paul, who also `fought the good fight to the end.' But both apostles remained always joyful and faithful, just as both remained flawed and (in their personalities, at least) fallible. Today, then, might be a day for speaking of the essential nature of Christ's Church as the in-gathering of the people of God in worship and witness; as the place where we, the flawed, are called into Christ's service. And it might be the moment to reiterate our vision for the healing of that Church: no longer `Protestant' or `Catholic' but all of us presided over in charity by the successor of Peter and guided by the irreplaceable teaching of Paul.