Augustine
of Hippo:
The
blessed Peter, the first of the Apostles, the ardent lover of Christ, who was
found worthy to hear, “And I say to you, that you are Peter” (Matthew
16:13-20).
He
himself, you see, had just said, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living
God.” Christ said to him, ”And I say to
you that you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church.”
Upon
this rock I will build the faith you have just confessed. Upon your words, “You
are the Christ, the Son of the living God,” I will build my Church; because you
are Peter.
Peter
comes from petra, meaning a rock. Peter, “Rocky”, from “rock”; not “rock” from
“Rocky”. Peter comes from the word for a rock in exactly the same way as the
name Christian comes from Christ.
Before
his passion the Lord Jesus, as you know, chose those disciples of his whom he
called apostles. Among these it was only Peter who almost everywhere was given
the privilege of representing the whole Church.
It
was in the person of the whole Church, which he alone represented, that he was
privileged to hear, “To you will I give the keys of the kingdom of heaven.”
After all, it is not just one man that received these keys, but the Church in
its unity.
So
this is the reason for Peter’s acknowledged pre-eminence, that he stood for the
Church’s universality and unity, when he was told, “To you I am entrusting,”
what has in fact been entrusted to all.
To
show you that it is the Church which has received the keys of the kingdom of
heaven, listen to what the Lord says in another place to all his apostles:
“Receive the Holy Spirit; and immediately afterwards, Whose sins you forgive,
they will be forgiven them; whose sins you retain, they will be retained” (John
20:22-23).
Quite
rightly, too, did the Lord after his resurrection entrust his sheep to Peter to
be fed (Jn. 21: 15-19). It is not, you see, that he alone among the disciples
was fit to feed the Lord’s sheep; but when Christ speaks to one man, unity is being
commended to us.
And
he first speaks to Peter, because Peter is the first among the apostles. Do not
be sad, Apostle. Answer once, answer again, answer a third time. Let confession
conquer three times with love, because self-assurance was conquered three times
by fear.
What
you had bound three times must be loosed three times. Loose through love what
you had bound through fear. And for all that, the Lord once, and again, and a
third time, entrusted his sheep to Peter.
Augustine
of Hippo (354-430): Sermon 295, 1-2, 4, 7-8 (PL 38, 1348-1352); from the Office
of Readings for the Solemnity of St Peter and St Paul, June 29th @ Crossroads
Initiative.
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