Pillars of Faith

Gospel: Matthew 16: 13-19

Today's feast is about two people who are examples of faith, two men who find their way to Rome and meet their deaths at the hands of the Empire.  It is for this reason that their feast is celebrated together on this day in the Western Church.  For these two individuals were two of the most noteworthy members of the first group of Christians to face martyrdom at the hands of the Roman Empire.  For both, such an outcome for their lives was most unlikely earlier in their lives.

Peter was a fisherman from Galilee. He comes to follow Jesus, but struggles time and again in his faith.  He has moments of great insight, but also moments of great doubt and failure.  Yet, in the end he lays down his life for others, like his Lord and Master.  Paul was an avid persecutor of the Christian movement, but finds his way to faith through a personal experience and support from the community he persecuted.  Struggling with his own trials, Paul too will suffer the fate he had once imposed on other Christians.  

Saints are not perfect people.  That's what makes them fascinating and worth knowing.  They become little lights for us that help point the way to the ultimate Light of God in our lives.  Once discovered, this divine illumination, this divinization, transforms our own lives as it did for Peter and Paul.  It too can lead us to great works of faith and mercy, and yes perhaps great witness in death to this faith and the Light that is our Way and Life.