Word to the Wise
Wednesday, February 22, 2017 - Feb. 22 - The Chair of St. Peter, Apostle
[1 Pet 5:1-4 and Matt 16:13-19]"And so I say to you, you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my Church, and the gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it. I will give you the keys to the Kingdom of heaven. Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven."
When I was in grade school and high school, the words quoted above from today's gospel scripture were drummed into us. We Catholics were not in the majority in my home town and the Pope was considered the "anti-Christ" by many of our neighbors of Protestant persuasion. Those "apologetic" days are pretty much gone now, especially with the attractive figures of recent popes who seem to have reached the whole world rather than being exotic potentates ruling over Catholics from a baroque palace in Rome. The feast of The Chair of St. Peter the Apostle is a celebration of the ministry of the pope - the Petrine ministry. (Others also discern a "Pauline" and a "Marian" ministerial element.)
Depending on one's starting point in thinking about the papacy, one might emphasize the "authority/obdience" side of that office or one might emphasize the "leader/service" side. Much will depend on the person elected to the office. The first might focus on what happens when the pope proclaims things from "the Chair", the second might focus on what the pope does when he gets up and moves around! In any case, we celebrate the role that Christ created for Peter and his successors in the papacy, knowing that history has shaped this role in many ways, as it is currently doing in the person of Pope Francis. Keep him in your prayers, please! AMEN
config
view
logs
3840.0 KB
77 ms
4
