Today’s Gospel is the Gospel in which the keys are
given to Peter. The Catholic tradition has always
taken this Gospel as the basis for the Pope’s
authority over the entire Church.
Someone might object that there is nothing here
about the papal office. Catholic theology responds
in the following way. If Peter is called the
Church’s “foundation” or “rock,” then the Church can
only continue to exist if its foundation continues
to exist.
It is unthinkable that such solemn prerogatives --
“To you I give the keys of the kingdom of heaven” --
refer only to the first 20 or 30 years of the
Church’s life, and that they would cease with the
apostle’s death. Peter’s role thus continues in his
successors.
Throughout the first millennium, all the Churches
universally recognized this office of Peter, even if
somewhat differently in East and West.
The problems and divisions crept up in the second
millennium, which has just concluded.
Today we Catholics admit that these problems and
divisions are not entirely the fault of the others,
the so-called schismatics, first the Eastern
Churches and then the Protestants.
The primacy instituted by Christ, as all things
human, has sometimes been exercised well and at
other times not so well. Gradually political and
worldly power mixed with the spiritual power and
with this came abuses.
Pope John Paul II, in his letter on ecumenism, “Ut
unum sint,” suggested the possibility of
reconsidering the concrete forms in which the Pope’s
primacy is exercised in such a way as to make the
concord of all the Churches around the Pope possible
again. As Catholics, we must hope that this road of
conversion to reconciliation be followed with ever
greater courage and humility, especially
implementing incrementally the collegiality called
for by the Second Vatican Council.
What we cannot desire is that the ministry itself of
Peter, as sign and source of the Church’s unity,
will disappear. This would deprive us of one of the
most precious gifts that Christ has given to the
Church besides going against Christ’s own will.
To think that the Church only needs the Bible and
the Holy Spirit to interpret it in order for the
Church to live and spread the Gospel, is like saying
that it would have been sufficient for the founders
of the United States to write the American
Constitution and show the spirit in which it must be
interpreted without providing any government for the
country. Would the United States still exist?
One thing that we can all immediately do to smooth
the road toward reconciliation between the Churches
is to begin reconciling ourselves with our Church.
“You are Peter and upon this rock I will build my
Church”: Jesus says my “Church,” in the singular,
not my “churches.” He had thought of and wanted only
one Church, not a multiplicity of independent
churches, or worse, churches fighting among
themselves.
The word “my,” as in “my Church,” is possessive.
Jesus recognizes the Church as “his”; he says “my
Church” as a man would say “my bride” or “my body.”
He identifies himself with it, he is not ashamed of
it.
On Jesus’ lips the word “Church” does not have any
of those subtle negative meanings that we have added
to it.
There is in that expression of Christ a powerful
call to all believers to reconcile themselves with
the Church. To deny the Church is like denying your
own mother. “You cannot have God for father,” St.
Cyprian said, “if you do not have the Church for
your mother.”
It would be a beautiful fruit of the feast of the
holy Apostles Peter and Paul if we too were to learn
to say of the Catholic Church to which we belong
that it is "my Church!"
