Deacon Cornell’s Homily

“You are Peter and on this rock I will build my Church.” One of the commentators on this passage says that writers through the centuries have delighted in the fact that something as great and significant as the Church was founded with a pun! The pun is a little more obvious in Greek: You are Petros and upon this petra I will build my Church. In Aramaic, the language Jesus almost surely spoke these words in, it is even better because both words would be kepa.

And to this rock, Jesus says, "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 will be loosed in heaven.” 

When I was younger, I had a problem with this statement of Jesus. To me that meant that Jesus was giving Peter and the Church the power to tell God (heaven) what to do. Why on earth or in heaven would Jesus do that, knowing how unreliable human beings are? And then in 1999 the movie Dogma came out. The plot was basically two banished angel trying to take advantage of this "loophole" by doing what was required to earn a plenary indulgence declared by a bishop in Red Bank NJ. In other words, the plot was basically that since a bishop (who represents the Church) declared that performing a specified action would have all their punishment resulting from their sins removed and so they would able to re-enter heaven. This satirical take on this power of the keys given in this Gospel passage made it clear to me that I was not understanding this passage correctly.

So I read this passage over and over again, and finally went to my interlinear translation of the Gospels, where I started to see a whole different way of understanding this passage. The Greek words that are translated here as “shall be bound in heaven” and “shall be loosed in heaven” are forms of the verb that imply past completion. The literal translation in my interlinear book was “shall be having been bound in heaven”, and “shall be having been loosed in heaven”. The sense I get from that is not that Peter or his successors are making a decision here on earth which then causes that to happen in heaven, but rather a promise that when Peter or his successors make a decision of importance here on earth, that Jesus will be there to guide that decision so that it is made in harmony with what is already true in heaven. It is not God letting the Church drive around wherever she wants and then saying that that was the right way, but Jesus promising always to be whispering the right directions in the Church’s ear. And then even when the Church makes a wrong turn, staying right with her and giving her new directions to get back on track.

I know it is sometimes hard to believe that Jesus has bestowed this protection on the Church's teaching and that the "gates of the netherworld" will not prevail against the rock on which it was built. I don't think I am exaggerating when I say that some of the things that have happened in the Church even in just the past few decades has caused suffering and pain, and has shaken the faith of many of us. How do we understand today's Gospel in light of that suffering?

For me, one key to all of this is that “Messianic Secret” expressed in the last line of today’s reading. Jesus tells the disciples not to tell anyone about him being the Christ because he knows that no one can even begin to understand who Jesus really is as the Christ, until they see him die on the cross. Without a deep understanding of the suffering and death on the cross, we cannot know who Jesus is. We cannot know who we are as Church until we understand the suffering part. As Church we are the sacrament of Christ on earth. In other words, we are called to make Christ visible, tangible, incarnate, here on earth. We cannot understand this call unless we understand that it is a call to suffering, as well as a call to resurrection and redemption.

I don’t pretend to understand God’s inscrutable judgments or unsearchable ways but I know that his word is always trustworthy. I know that because I have experienced it in my own life as well as in scripture and tradition.

Jesus said he will be with us always, and that the gates of hell will not prevail against his Church built on the foundation of the rock he chose, a rock chosen not because the rock is perfect or without sin, but worthy because Jesus chose him. I trust that. I also trust that in our current suffering we can be configured more closely to Christ whose body we are. I don’t like that but I trust that.

So as we approach this table of Eucharist, of thanksgiving, even if we are in pain or are confused or uncertain, let us give thanks to God for the promise of Jesus to be with us forever. And buoyed by that promise let us say with Paul, “To God be glory forever. Amen”

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