Know yourself, know the Lord

Today was another day spent at the Mount of Beatitudes. It also marked our first exam for the semester! After our first class studying the Prophets of the Old Testament, we took an exam on the beginning chapters of the Gospel of John. With the test completed in the morning, many of us had the afternoon free to catch up on reading, emails, phone calls or to visit the holy sites in the surrounding area.

A fair amount of us decided to return to and visit the Primacy of Peter in Tabgah, again, the region along the Sea of Galilee where Jesus appeared to his disciples in John 21 after his Resurrection. The nice thing about staying at the Mount of Beatitudes is that the Primacy of Peter is only about a half hour walk down the mountain. It was a common spot for guys to visit and pray today in particular since the Church today celebrates the Feast of the Chair of St. Peter. According to the Liturgy of the Hours, “Since the fourth century, the feast of the Chair of Peter has been celebrated at Rome as a sign of the unity of the Church founded upon that apostle.” In 2012, Pope Benedict XVI described the chair, located in St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome, as "a symbol of the special mission of Peter and his Successors to tend Christ’s flock, keeping it united in faith and in charity." The Primacy of Peter then, the very place where Christ entrusted him his flock and instructed him to “feed my sheep”, could not have been a more fitting spot to spend the afternoon!

What makes Peter so great? Well certainly he wasn’t chosen out of the Apostles to be the Shepherd of Christ’s flock par excellence because he was perfect, the most elite, or the most qualified. During their first encounter, Peter himself admits to the Lord, “Depart from me, for I am a sinful man!” Often Peter seems to say the wrong things, such as when he is rebuked by Jesus for trying to dissuade him from going to Jerusalem to suffer his Passion, or perhaps most evidently when he publicly denies Jesus not once but three times! So, what makes Peter so great? Why would the Lord choose him to be the “prototype” set before all the shepherds of the Church as St. Leo the Great once pronounced? 

I would like to offer two reasons for reflection. First, Peter knew himself. He knew that he was a sinner, that he was weak, that he didn’t always have it together, and that he was prone to making mistakes. Second, Peter knew the Lord! He ate with him, journeyed with him, listened to him, observed his example, and was chosen along with James and John to be with Jesus during some of the most intimate moments of Jesus’ ministry, from the Transfiguration to the Garden of Gethsemane. He knew the Lord so intimately, in fact, that at a most opportune time, by a grace given to him by God, Peter was able to recognize and profess Jesus as the Messiah, the Son of the Living God! In the end, it didn’t matter how unqualified or qualified, imperfect or perfect Peter was. What mattered was that he knew himself and he knew Jesus, meaning, he knew that Jesus, prompted by merciful love, had the power to supply all that he himself lacked. What better candidate to Shepherd the flock of Christ!?

Peter is a good example for all of us in life. Surely all of us have struggles, we all experience failures and make mistakes, none of us are perfect.  Do we make this an occasion of despair as Peter was tempted to do or do we run to Jesus, believing that he is who he says he is, that he loves us, and that he has the power to supply all that we ourselves lack? As the famous saying goes, “God does not call the qualified but qualifies the called.”