There are many saints in the Church.
Many martyrs.
Many great missionaries.
Many holy men and women.
Yet today the Church stops and celebrates two men together.
Peter and Paul.
The two great pillars of the Church.
The fisherman.
And the scholar.
The Galilean.
And the Roman citizen.
One called from his fishing nets.
The other struck down on the road to Damascus.
Very different men.
Very different personalities.
Very different backgrounds.
Yet united by one thing.
Jesus Christ.
And perhaps that is where we should begin.
Because when people think about Peter and Paul, they often think about what they did.
Peter the first Pope.
Paul the great missionary.
But before either man did anything for Christ, Christ had done something for them.
He had called them.
Changed them.
Saved them.
In today’s Gospel Jesus asks a question:
“Who do you say I am?”
It is the most important question ever asked.
Not:
What do people think of me?
Not:
What does society say?
Not:
What is fashionable?
But:
“Who do you say I am?”
Peter answers:
“You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.”
And everything changes.
Because Christianity begins there.
Not with rules.
Not with customs.
Not with traditions.
It begins with a person.
Jesus Christ.
The Son of God.
That confession is the rock upon which the Church is built.
Peter does not invent Christianity.
Peter receives the truth revealed by the Father.
And Christ entrusts to him a unique role.
“You are Peter, and on this rock I will build my Church.”
Not churches.
Not competing versions of Christianity.
My Church.
That is why today’s feast is so important.
It reminds us that Christianity is not something we make up as we go along.
The faith is received.
Handed down.
Guarded.
Protected.
Through the apostles and their successors.
Yet if Peter shows us the stability of the Church, Paul shows us her mission.
The Gospel is not meant to remain hidden.
It is meant to go out to the nations.
To every people.
Every language.
Every culture.
Every generation.
And what is striking is that neither Peter nor Paul looked especially impressive at first.
Peter could be impulsive.
Weak.
Fearful.
He denied Christ three times.
Paul persecuted Christians.
He approved of Stephen’s death.
He tried to destroy the Church.
If you were choosing leaders for a worldwide mission, neither would seem an obvious choice.
Yet God delights in working through weak people.
Because then the glory belongs to Him.
Look at the first reading.
Peter is in prison.
Chained.
Guarded.
Awaiting execution.
Humanly speaking, the situation is hopeless.
Yet God sends an angel.
The chains fall away.
The prison doors open.
Peter walks free.
Then look at St Paul in the second reading.
His life is ending.
The great missionary has reached the finish line.
He says:
“I have fought the good fight. I have finished the race. I have kept the faith.”
What a magnificent sentence.
Not:
“I have been successful.”
Not:
“I have been comfortable.”
Not:
“I have been admired.”
But:
“I have kept the faith.”
That is the real measure of a Christian life.
Not wealth.
Not status.
Not popularity.
Faithfulness.
Did I remain faithful to Christ?
Did I keep the faith?
Peter and Paul both teach us that.
Not because they were perfect.
But because they remained faithful.
Peter fell.
But he got up again.
Paul sinned.
But he was converted.
Both knew weakness.
Both knew suffering.
Both knew fear.
Yet both remained faithful to the end.
And perhaps that is important for us to hear.
Because many Catholics think holiness belongs to extraordinary people.
People unlike us.
People born different.
People with greater gifts.
Peter was not born a saint.
Paul was not born a saint.
They became saints because they allowed Christ to transform them.
They kept saying yes to grace.
Again and again.
And in our own day we need the witness of Peter and Paul more than ever.
We live in a culture confused about truth.
Confused about identity.
Confused about God.
Many people no longer know what to believe.
Others have stopped asking.
The answer is not for the Church to become more like the world.
The answer is what it has always been.
To proclaim Jesus Christ.
Clearly.
Faithfully.
Courageously.
Peter teaches us to hold fast to the truth.
Paul teaches us to share that truth with the world.
And both remind us that Christ remains faithful to His Church.
The Roman Empire tried to destroy them.
It failed.
Persecutions came.
The Church survived.
Empires rose and fell.
The Church remained.
Because the promise of Christ remains true:
“The gates of hell shall not prevail against it.”
Today we honour Peter and Paul.
Two very different men.
United by one Lord.
Two sinners transformed by grace.
Two apostles who changed the world.
Two martyrs who gave everything for Christ.
And they leave us with one question.
When our own race is finished, when our own life draws to its close, what will matter most?
Not what we owned.
Not what we achieved.
Not what others thought of us.
But whether, like Peter and Paul, we can finally say:
“I have kept the faith.”
St. Mary's, St. John Bosco and St. Edward's 