Solemnity of Saints Peter and Paul

Today the Church celebrates two of its greatest saints: Peter, the Prince of the Apostles, and Paul, the Apostle to the Gentiles. In the Communion of Saints – outside of Mary, John the Baptist, and Joseph, the Foster Father of Jesus – the Church accords its highest respect to these two apostles. More than anyone else, it is on account of the witness of their teaching, preaching, and eventually, martyrdom that the love of Jesus was made known to Jews and Gentiles alike and that the Christian faith was spread around the ancient world.

While we remember them with great esteem this day and ask for their saintly intercession, we also recall the two pivotal events in their lives in which they were not yet the great saints they would become. For Peter, the pivotal moment in his relationship with Jesus came not in his decision to follow Jesus (Lk 5:1-11), or in his expression of faith in him (Mt 16:13-20), but much later, after the Lord's suffering, death, and Resurrection. The great black mark on Peter's discipleship, of course, is his betrayal of the Lord in his Passion, a betrayal that in many ways was worse than that of Judas. Judas handed Christ over to the authorities; Peter denied three times even knowing who he was. While the Risen Christ extends his mercy and peace to the Apostles upon greeting them in the Upper Room, it is perhaps not until the encounter on the shore of the Sea of Galilee (Jn 21:15-19) that this betrayal is truly healed and undone. Jesus asks if Peter loves him, and Peter responds "Yes," three times, once for each of his denials, signifying his recommitment to the Lord. No doubt this experience of mercy was truly transformative for Peter's life. Having received the kind forgiveness from the Friend he knew and loved so much but whom he had let down, Peter becomes the Apostle he was meant to be, and spends the rest of his life proving his fidelity to his promise to tend the Lord's flock, even by laying down his own life.

The pivotal moment in Paul's life occurred when he was known still as "Saul". A devout and learned Jew, Saul was zealous for Jewish orthodoxy and was willing to even use violence to stamp out those who believed in the Resurrection of Christ. Yet, on the road to Damascus, he encountered the Risen Jesus (Acts 9:3-9) and had his world completely overturned. Having seen the Lord in glory, he understands that the Christian message really is true and he devotes his life to the Lord from that point forward. Paul never knew Jesus prior to this encounter but he becomes arguably his greatest Apostle, commissioned not by the others (though he did receive their blessing) but by Jesus himself. It is thanks to Paul that the Church understands that the Gospel message is not just for Jewish believers but for all peoples, of all times, from all walks of life. The wide reach of the Church's motherly embrace is directly linked to the encounter Paul had on the road to Damascus.

What does this feast mean for us? First, it is a chance to celebrate these two great saints. In many ways, they were very different. Paul was well-educated; Peter likely was not. Peter was Jesus's intimate friend in his life and ministry; Paul did not know him at all before his death and Resurrection. Yet despite their very different backgrounds, they are celebrated together because of the One whom they served together, each in his own way.  Peter ministered primarily to the Jewish believers, while Paul had great success in converting Gentiles. As the first pope, Peter exercised the special ministry of leading and unifying the Church, while Paul embodied par excellence the Church's work of evangelization. In coming to know Jesus, there is no danger of losing one's identity; rather, one only truly finds it in him. Each in his own way, these two Pillars of the Church discovered their identities in their discipleship of Jesus and gave their lives to build up the Church.

Second, the pivotal moments of Peter's life and Paul's life mentioned above remind us that an encounter of mercy is fundamental to true discipleship. One can begin following Jesus without the experience of being forgiven, but a mature faith only develops when one understands the need for conversion. The Christian message only truly becomes real and personal when we discover our own need for healing, and we discover in the Lord new hope and new life in the forgiveness that only Christ can offer. Perhaps we can consider today, in our own hearts, whether we have had our own seashore experience with the Lord, our own encounter on the road to Damascus. If so, we should return spiritually to that place again and again, finding there the strength to continue with our Christian vocation. If not, then perhaps we should listen for the Lord's inviting us to that encounter with mercy, so that we can find our true and lasting identity – so that we can see ourselves, and love ourselves, as Jesus does.

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Following the French Revolution in the late 18th century, monastic life in France was virtually non-existent for nearly 50 years. It returned largely through the work of the Benedictine monk Prosper Guéranger, who refounded the medieval Abbey at Solesmes and who served as its abbot for decades after. Dom Guéranger was also a major scholar of the liturgy, especially chant and liturgical music, and he contributed much to the understanding we have today of the hymns and chants that have come down to us from the early Church, especially from Rome.

For today's great feast, Dom Guéranger gives us a hymn attributed to Elpis, a Roman woman of the 5th century and wife of the famous philosopher Boethius. The third stanza remarks upon the glory of the city of Rome, where Peter and Paul both died and where their bones are found to this day. It is taken from another poem by St. Paulinus of Aquileia. Here's the text of the hymn (and its translation) as well as a worthy rendition.

AUREA LUCE (5th Century)

Aurea luce et decore roseo,
Lux lucis, omne perfudisti saeculum:
decorans caelos inclito martyrio.
Hac sacra die, quae dat reis veniam.

Janitor caeli, doctor orbis pariter,
Judices saecli, vera mundi lumina:
Per crucem alter, alter ense triumphans,
Vitae senatum laureati possident.

O felix Roma, quae tantorum principum
es purpurata pretioso sanguine,
non laude tua, sed ipsorum meritis
excellis omnem mundi pulchritudinem.

Jam, bone Pastor Petre, clemens accipe
Vota precantum, et peccati vincula
Resolve, tibi potestate tradita,
Qua cunctis cœlum verbo claudis, aperis.

Doctor egregie, Paule, mores instrue,
Et mente polum nos transferre satage:
Donec perfectum largiatur plenus,
Evacuato quod ex parte gerimus.

Olivae binae pietatis unicae,
fide devotos, spe robustos maxime,
fonte repletos caritatis geminae
post mortem carnis impetrate vivere.

Sit Trinitati sempiterna gloria,
honor, potestas atque iubilatio,
in unitate, cui manet imperium
ex tunc et modo per aeterna saecula.

LIGHT OF DAWN

O light of dawn, O rosy glow,
O Light from Light, all ages show
Your beauty, and the martyrs fame,
That gain us pardon from our blame.

The heavens' porter, and earth’s sage,
The world’s bright lights who judge the age.
One wins by cross, and one by sword,
And life on high is their reward.

These are your princes, happy Rome!
Their precious blood clothes you, their home.
We praise not you, but praise their worth,
Beyond all beauty of the earth.

Kind Shepherd, Peter, unto thee was given
The keys to close and ope the gates of heaven;
Strike from our souls the galling chain of crime,
And gain the grace for which our hearts have striven.

O learned Paul, inspire us from above
With all the graces of the Heavenly Dove;
Bring us the faith to see the truth of God,
And brighten earth with the sweet reign of love.

One love, one faith, twin olive trees,
One great strong hope filled both of these.
Full fonts, in your matched charity,
Pray that we may in heaven be.

Give glory to the Trinity
And honor to the Unity,
And joy and pow’r, for their reign stays
Today and through all endless days.

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God's Vector

When I was a senior in high school, I took physics as an elective course. Several of my friends and I decided to take the plunge on this particular course not only because it was known to be particularly challenging but also because it was taught by a priest. Fr. Lawrence Frederick – or “Father Fred” as he was known to us – was not only a man of God; he was a scientist and an engineer. In fact, we knew that before he became a priest he had worked on the Gemini space project at NASA. Needless to say, this man of great learning was an attraction in himself.

The class itself was great. It was hard, but it taught me things that I still remember to this day. For example, one thing Father Fred taught us was that every force in nature – gravity, electromagnetism – is a vector: that is, it has both a magnitude and a direction. In other words, when you look at the natural world, you should think not only about the powers that are present there, but also in what direction those powers are aimed.

The same is true for spiritual powers. In the liturgy today, we celebrate the birth of a man of great spiritual power: John the Baptist. The Catholic Church, as you know, celebrates lots of saints in the course of our liturgical calendar. All throughout the year we celebrate various men and women who gave witness to Christ in a variety of ways. Typically we celebrate their feast days on the anniversary of their day of death, or on some other important day in their life. But only in two cases do we celebrate the birth of a saint. The first is Mary, the mother of Jesus, and the second is John the Baptist. What makes these two saints particularly important, such that we should celebrate not the end of their lives but the beginning? 

 Saint John the Baptist (1657) by Philippe de Champaigne

The answer, as you might guess, is Jesus. Mary’s birth marks the entrance into the world of she who accepted God’s will so completely, so faithfully that the Savior was born from her own humanity. The birth of John the Baptist also heralds the coming of Christ. The Son of God drew his flesh and blood identity from his Mother Mary, but the identity of his mission is one related to all that John the Baptist represents. Traditionally, the Church has celebrated John the Baptist as the last of the Old Testament prophets. He sums up the whole of God’s message to the Jewish people, and he is the one who prepares Israel for the coming of her Savior at long last. We might think of John as a kind of a vector, pointing others to Christ. In the words, of Isaiah, he is the “sharp-edged sword”, the “polished arrow,” directing all of his spiritual might toward the coming of One greater than he, toward the Messiah himself.

Celebrating the birth of John the Baptist would seem to make much more sense in the time of Advent, when we are preparing for the celebration of Jesus’s own birth. And yet, here we are in June, about as far removed from Christmas as one can be in the calendar. This feast falls smack dab in the middle of summer not only because tomorrow is six months from Christmas. It is also intended to be a reminder for us that God wishes at all times to remind us of the saving gift of his Son Jesus. Indeed, he desires to orient everything – all aspects of his creation, indeed each and every one of us – toward Christ himself.

As we heard in the first reading, God has created each us of us in our mother’s womb, and so he knows each of us individually, and he has created each of us with a particular identity for a purpose. God gave the prophets of old, John the Baptist, and especially Mary the privileged grace of having identities that pointed the way to Jesus in advance of his coming. The entirety of their being – everything that they were – was intended to be a kind of spiritual force directed at the Savior who would soon follow. Those of us who come after Jesus are nonetheless also to point the way to him, not chronologically but spiritually. God desires that we allow the capacity of our being – the whole of our spiritual identity – to be oriented toward Christ, recalling always the redemption that he has won for us and the salvation that we hope for. Like John the Baptist, we are called to be a kind of vector pointing toward Christ, so that we may always find our true bearings in him and so that others, through us, can also find him as well.

"Jesus Christ and Saint John the Forerunner", The Deësis mosaic, c. 1260, Hagia Sophia, Istanbul

Today’s solemnity is important enough that it takes precedence over the celebration of the Sundays of Ordinary Time. To my mind, at least, it is a welcome break. In the middle of summer, six months out from Christmas, today’s feast gives us the chance to ask ourselves anew: what does the coming of Christ really mean for me? In what way is my life directed toward Jesus, like John the Baptist was? How am I using the gifts that God has given me to direct others to Christ?
If those are the questions the Church wants to ask ourselves today, then we should be creative with our answers. Everything in our lives can become a sign to others of the love of Jesus, if done consciously with that intention, if we allow ourselves to be aimed toward Christ. Each relationship, each obligation, each burden or suffering, each joy and happiness, each viewpoint – all of them can be incorporated into our relationship with Jesus. Even more importantly, if we seek to orient ourselves to him, then Jesus will imbue each of those relationships, obligations, burdens, joys, and viewpoints with new and profound meaning, and he will make them an avenue for grace and for growth in him.

Friends, John the Baptist was born into our world for the sole reason of pointing others to Jesus, a mission that he carried out faithfully and well. That is our mission too; may we carry it out well. Father Fred taught my high school classmates and I a lot about physics. But he taught us far more by his simple presence in the classroom, by being a priest who loved science and wanted to share his knowledge with students. In his own way, he did what John the Baptist did – he directed us to Jesus, and showed us that all things find new meaning in him. The Lord can do great things in us if we accept the tasks of our daily lives with great humility and with deep faith, and if we remember that in all things, we too can help point the way to Christ.

The Lord's Living Memorial

This past week, the father of a childhood friend of mine passed away. He had been receiving treatment for an illness when he suffered some complications that brought his life to an end far sooner than his family had expected. In her grief, my friend sent an email to some in our friend group, beautifully reflecting on what her father had meant to her and what he had taught her. She closed the email stating that “we know his presence and values will endure through those of us who knew him”.

No doubt, we can all relate to those words, or will one day. It is part of the human experience to learn to let go of people whom we love and who loved us and who pass from this life, and to find a way to both move on with our life and also to not lose them entirely – to remember them in a way that is meaningful and lasting. We have all kinds of cultural ways of doing this – by telling and re-telling stories about them, by holding on to keepsakes and relics that were theirs or that remind us of them, by visiting their resting places to offer prayers or tributes. Perhaps most of us though also understand the limitations of those things. Stories and heirlooms and graveside visits ultimately don’t mean nearly enough. What we want is that person with us again; and short of that, we hope for what my friend hopes for – a sense of continued connection internally, a sense that the presence and values of our loved one somehow endure within us.

In the Gospel today, Jesus is preparing his disciples for his departure. Though his physical body suffered no illness or malady, he knew that his time with them was drawing to a close, and that soon he would accomplish his mission – to offer himself on the Cross as the eternal sacrifice of redemption for humanity’s sinfulness and thus to restore God’s creation to himself. This was the great and ultimate purpose for which he had come, and so he approaches that hour with resolution, with love, even with joy. And yet, our Lord also knew how difficult that departure would be for his disciples. His time with them was coming to a close – while he would be rise again after three days, he would soon ascend to his heavenly Father and so would no longer be physically present among them.

The Last Supper (c. 1562) by Joan de Joanes

With all of this in mind, Jesus gave his loved ones a wonderful gift: the sacred meal that we celebrate today and indeed every time that we gather together. The Eucharist is the living memorial of the love of Christ for us, a sign of the covenant that we have with God in Jesus. Much like the acts of remembrance that we do and say for loved ones who have passed on, the Eucharist helps us to keep the remembrance of Christ’s sacrifice on the Cross alive in our memories, so that we never forget the mystery of salvation that he has won for us. We “do this in memory of him”, recalling that each time we eat this Bread and drink this Cup, we proclaim the death of the Lord, until he comes again.

But! As wonderful as all of that is, though, that is only the first part of the meaning of today’s feast. Nothing that I have so far described is particularly unique to us as Catholics. If you go into a Baptist church or a Lutheran church or an Anglican church, you will find that same sense of things: of communion being a memorial of the Lord’s love, a way of reminding ourselves of his sacrifice. But memory only goes so far – it can remind us, maybe console us, but it cannot give us what we most desire: the presence of the one we love.

And that is why when Christ instituted the Sacrament of his Body and Blood, what he commanded us to do was not only to remember something long ago, but to participate anew in a reality that is still very much present. The Lord’s love was not only shown for us on the Cross 2000 years ago – it becomes really present for us again at every Mass, when we are made present spiritually at the foot of the Cross, at the very moment of Jesus’s act of redemption. Through the sacrifice we offer in the Mass, Christ’s sacrifice on the Cross is not only remembered but made present again, offered anew to the heavenly Father so that the merits of our redemption long ago become present for us here and now.

Even greater, of course, it is our firm Catholic faith that the Sacrament of the Lord’s Body and Blood is not only a memorial, not only a sacrifice, but also his very Real Presence. By calling to mind the love he showed us, by becoming present anew at his sacrifice, he accomplishes what we cannot – he goes beyond mere memory to answer the deep desire of our hearts: to be present again to the one we love and the one who loves us. The Eucharist is the ultimate gift of Jesus to his Church, because it is the gift of his very Self, living and enduring with us.

The feast that we celebrate today – the Solemnity of the Most Holy Body and Blood of Christ – marks the conclusion of a series of feasts that we have been celebrating since Easter Sunday. For five weeks, we celebrate the central reality of our faith – that Christ has conquered sin and death and offers to us the redemption he has won. On the Feast of the Ascension, we celebrated that the Risen Jesus has gone ahead of us to his Father, where he intercedes for us at his right hand. The next week, on the Feast of Pentecost, we remembered that the Lord has sent us the gift of the Holy Spirit to help us live well our Christian identity in this life, directing us to the life to come. Last week, we celebrated that the Lord has revealed his own divine Being to be a Communion of Love, of three Persons in one God, a communion which he invites us to share. And finally, today, we recognize that the Lord, drawing us ever closer to our heavenly home, feeds and animates us with his own Body and Blood as our food for the journey.

Today then is an opportunity to appreciate anew the greatest treasure we have on this earth: the Holy Eucharist. To live the Christian life is not an easy thing; to be faithful to Jesus and to what he commanded us to do as his disciples is challenging. It was that way for the disciples long ago, and it is that way still for us now. We must endure challenge and even persecutions at times for what we believe, especially when the wise ones of this world do not agree. We must live charitably, not giving into the temptations to become petty and begrudging, but always taking the higher road of love. We have to persevere with faith and hope despite sufferings that sometimes are inexplicable, like the too-soon passing of a loved one.

These things are hard. If all we had to guide us and to help us was mere memory – a spiritual heirloom of something that happened long ago – then we would surely fail in our faithfulness. But what we have is so much greater than that. Jesus knows that what we need most to be his disciples – that what we want most to be confirmed and consoled in our journey – is Jesus himself, and so for that reason, he continually makes himself available, present, accessible to us in the Eucharist. Each time we come to Mass, we are not just reminded of the Lord’s love, we experience it anew – made present again at the foot of the Cross, we are nourished by our Lord’s very Self, as food for our journey and hope for eternal life.

Friends, we need not long for the presence of Jesus, as if he were a loved one who has passed beyond our midst. His physical, resurrected body may be in heaven, in glory with his Father, but he has not left us. At each Mass he displays his love and humility to become present in the Eucharist, to be received by each of us so that we may live out our identities as members of his Mystical Body with the love and presence of his Sacramental Body radiating through us. All heaven and earth is caught up in this sacramental mystery, so that in a very real way we are never closer to God – and never closer to those who have passed from this life – than when we are at Mass, receiving the Lord’s Body and Blood.

As we come forward again in a few moments to partake of that sacrament which is both “the Source and the Summit of our faith” (Lumen gentium 11, Vatican II) let us meet the Lord’s humility with our own, bowing low in our hearts to receive the One who loves us so ardently and who nourishes us so faithfully. O Sacrament most Holy, O Sacrament Divine, all praise and all thanksgiving, be every moment Thine.