3rd Sunday of Easter C - Homily 6

Homily 6 - 2022

The whole of today’s delightful Gospel passage is worth reading. That can be your homework this weekend. But I want to concentrate simply on the short section of it that I read. We need to keep clearly in our minds right from the start its context. Some days or weeks earlier, Peter had three times denied that he even knew the soon-to-be-crucified Jesus.

In the meantime, the matter of his denial had not been dealt with openly with Jesus, and it still probably weighed heavily on Peter’s mind. Had he been tempted to psychologically deny that what he did was really so bad? Jesus would still have been crucified, after all. I suspect that Peter’s haste to get ashore from the boat to be with Jesus on the beach indicated his continuing, still pent up, love for him.

Jesus took Peter aside. He asked him straight three times: “Peter, do you love me?” What was he doing? Was this intended somehow to compensate for Peter’s triple denial? Was Jesus ‘twisting the knife’, as it were, quietly humiliating Peter, demanding his ‘pound of flesh’? Is that the sort of thing Jesus would do?

I think that Jesus was trying to reassure Peter. Jesus knew that, when Peter sinned, he also loved Jesus. The other Gospels make it clear. Immediately Peter had heard the cock crow, he realised what he had done — the awfulness of his denials — and “he went out and wept bitterly”. The very reason that Peter had followed Jesus into the High-priest’s house was that he did love Jesus. [Judas, sadly, was different. Rather than weep bitterly, he despaired. Judas didn’t know the heart of Jesus.]

The reality of Peter was that he was both sinner and lover — and he was not whole-heartedly either. His was not a case of “either/or” — his was rather “both/and”, simultaneously. And I think that that is the best way to describe myself. I do love God, but I also sin.

Jesus’ response to Peter was fascinating. He still loved Peter, despite, even during, his sin. Not only that, he trusted Peter, sinner and disciple, and entrusted to him a precious responsibility — “Feed my lambs; feed my sheep”.

I believe that Jesus waited until Peter was able to recognise his sin before entrusting to him the responsibility of cooperating with him in the on-going work of salvation. The recognition would keep him humble. The world does not need a self-righteous, opinionated Church. It needs struggling, persevering, fellow-pilgrims.

But it needs more. Without a clear certainty of God’s love for the world — sinners that we all are — we would have no message, certainly no message of hope. Deep down, all of us need to know “in our bones” that we are loved, that we do have a dignity which we ourselves are trying our best to appreciate, even when others may not.

As St Paul so sensitively wrote in his second Epistle to the Corinthians: "We are only the earthenware jars that hold this treasure, to make it clear that such an overwhelming power comes from God and not from us.” “Overwhelming power”, “treasure” , but in “earthenware jars”! They don't look much; they are not worth much; but, without them, where do we find the treasure?

An apt commentary on our present [and always-has-been] Church.