The Feast of the Chair of Saint Peter, Apostle, February 22, 2024

Matthew 16, 13-19

When Jesus went into the region of Caesarea Philippi he asked his disciples, “Who do people say that the Son of Man is?” They replied, “Some say John the Baptist, others Elijah, still others Jeremiah or one of the prophets.”  He said to them, “But who do you say that I am?” Simon Peter said in reply,  “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.”  Jesus said to him in reply, “Blessed are you, Simon son of Jonah. For flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my heavenly Father.  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.”

From very early in the history of the Holy Church, two feasts celebrated St. Peter in Rome.  The oldest recorded of the feasts (not necessarily the oldest of the feasts) was celebrated in Rome and commemorated January 18 as the day on which Peter offered the Sacrifice of the Mass in Rome for the first time.  The other feast celebrated “The Chair of Peter”, that is, the authority given to St. Peter and his successors as the visible head on earth of the people of God.  This feast was celebrated on February 22, traditionally the day on which Peter confessed that Jesus was the Son of God, after which the Lord said that he would give to the Apostle the keys to the kingdom of heaven.  Both feasts were celebrated at Rome from at least the early 300’s.  The Feast of Peter’s Chair became recognized as the greater of the two and in 1960 Pope John XXIII removed the January feast from the Roman calendar because it was seen to duplicate the February feast.  An oaken chair centuries-old and preserved at St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome is said to be the actual chair or throne which Peter used during his reign as the bishop of Rome, the first pope.  

“Who do people say that the Son of Man is?”  We should note that Jesus asks his Apostles whom the people say the Son of Man is, not whom the Pharisees or other authorities say.  We should also attend to the fact that he asks about “the Son of Man”.  While the Lord speaks of the Son of Man in the third person, he clearly is speaking of himself.  Do the Apostles accept this?  Simon the son of Jona does.  He does not say, when Jesus asks them who they think the Son of Man is, Simon answers, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.”   Simon does not say, The Son of Man is the Son of the living God; he says to Jesus, You are the Son of the living God.  Now, the Prophet Daniel, who prophesied about the Son of Man, did not identify him as either “the Christ” or as “the Son of the living God”.  He identified him as one to whom Almighty God would give “power, and glory, and a kingdom: and all peoples, tribes, and tongues shall serve him: his power is an everlasting power that shall not be taken away: and his kingdom that shall not be destroyed” (Daniel 7, 14).  A mighty figure, but not one anointed for the deliverance of Israel nor the very Son of the Living God.  Simon, however, links them together: the Son of Man is the anointed one, “the Christ”, and he is “the Son of the living God”.  And Jesus of Nazareth is this Son of Man.  It is not a Pharisee, trained in Scripture, or a scholar of the Law who confesses this; it is Simon the Galilean fisherman who does.  That he does so is more astounding than if he had sprouted wings and flown to the moon.  Only God could have revealed this to him and then given him the courage to say it aloud: “Flesh and blood has not revealed this to you, but my heavenly Father.”  That Jesus says “my” heavenly Father speaks of his personal and unique relationship with the Father.  No Jew would have spoken of God in that way.  You It would have been “our” Father, never “my”.

“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.”  Only one who has total authority over another may change the other’s name — because Hebrew names have meaning and they define a person — and so God changes Abram’s and Sarai’s names.  Jesus changes “Simon” to “rock”, which is not a name at all, underscoring the special nature of what Jesus does with Simon.  The phrase “build my Church” literally translates from the Greek as “builds my assembly”, which does not sound right in any language.  Jesus clearly has another meaning in mind: a Body of members in union with him and with each other through grace.  This Body will overthrow the powers of hell.

“I will give you the keys to the Kingdom of heaven.”  What Jesus says to the fisherman is even more astounding than what the fisherman had said to the Nazarene.  These keys open the gates of heaven to believers.  Peter’s hand is on the keys, and the Lord’s hand is on Peter’s.  “Whatever you bind on earth shall be bound in heaven; and whatever you loose on earth shall be loosed in heaven.”  The Lord says this in regard to the binding and loosing of sin: “Whose sins you shall forgive, they are forgiven them: and whose sins you shall retain, they are retained” (John 20, 23).  Peter, his successors, and those to whom he grants a share in this power — bishops and priests — can absolve all sins that can be absolved.  Sins for which there is no or insufficient contrition cannot be absolved, for grace is not magic.  Sins may be “retained” in this sense.

It is a great gift to the Church he founds that the Lord Jesus gives us a single, visible head.  This head is not morally infallible, for he can still commit sins, and he is only infallible when he teaches what the Church has always taught.  He is supposed to be a preserver of the truth, not an innovator in any way.  We pray for those who lead us, for their growth in holiness and wisdom, knowing that God writes straight with crooked lines, and does so in a way that may make sense only when he finishes writing and allows us to read all that  he has written.