Today’s readings: Acts 3, 1-10; Galatians 1, 11-20; John 21, 15-19.

The driving force for renewal and reform in the Church of these past decades was the Second Vatican Council, which in turn had its inspiration and roots in a theology that struggled hard to go back to the sources of Christianity. Going back to the sources was never meant as an archaeological enterprise, but was rather an in-depth exploration of what exactly gave origin to the Church and what still gives it life.

Since its inception, Christianity was meant to be a movement and in movement, rather than another religion clamped in its institutionalised form. Christianity was a dynamic force in the face of challenges coming both from the dominant Roman empire at the time and from a religious tradition that resisted change and culture. Christianity originated as a driving force in the first Apostles and Christians who stood their ground in the face of persecutions.

Jerusalem and Rome were the two poles in the life of St Peter and St Paul whom today we celebrate as witnesses who knew so well the source of the power that worked in them. Their witness began in Jerusalem and ended in Rome. They are considered as founders of the Church, yet they represent two movements in the early Church: one on the inside, meant to consolidate the Church and preside over its unity, the other representing its reaching out aspect, the Church’s opening up to the Gentiles and to all nations.

In Galatians today, St Paul staunchly reminds us that the message preached by him, and eventually by the Church throughout the ages, “is not a human message”. In St John’s gospel we read about the risen Lord entrusting his flock to Peter. St Peter and St Paul, protagonists of the early Church, are the depositaries of a treasure which by far transcends the temporal dimension. It is the treasure of eternal life.

That St Peter and St Paul were in Rome is relatively clear from the writings of Ignatius of Antioch and other later evidence that confirms that they died in Rome as martyrs in the persecution of Christians under Nero. Unfortunately, their witness and their founding roles are somewhat shadowed by controversy particularly when it comes to the office of St Peter as Bishop of Rome.

It was only in the late second century that the Western church derived its apostolicity from St Peter and St Paul in Rome. And it was starting from the third century that the Bishop of Rome made explicit claims to a pre-eminence which went beyond the region and was later applied to the whole Church. This led eventually to the Roman papacy as we know it today, a central office of leadership for the whole Church which the Pope holds as successor of St Peter.

The institution of this office of leadership has its traditional basis mainly in St Matthew’s gospel where Peter is referred to as the rock on which Jesus builds his Church and in the text from St John’s gospel read out today. Yet the existence of a central office of leadership for the whole Church is hardly compatible with the initial Church structure and experience.

We are at a point in time today when we need to come to terms with the sad reality of a divided Christianity, with so many Christians around the world who confess their faith in the risen Lord Jesus without envisaging, in the same manner we Catholics do, the ministry and role of the Bishop of Rome.

In his apostolic exhortation Evangelii Gaudium, Pope Francis speaks of an ecclesial renewal that cannot be deferred, and singles out “the conversion of the papacy”. In the footsteps of Pope John Paul II, who had asked for help in finding new ways of exercising his ministry as Pope, Pope Francis laments that in this regard, little progress has been achieved. “Excessive centralisation”, he writes, “rather than proving helpful, complicates the Church’s life and her missionary outreach”.

We do well today to seek wisdom and inspiration from St Peter and St Paul who, having interiorised the treasure of eternal life, spent their lives to affirm that the true identity of the Church is not in being a closed system but in reaching out.

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