Twenty-first Sunday in Ordinary Time, August 22, 2021 – Joshua 24:1-2A,15-17,18B; Ephesians 5:21-32; John 6:60-69

So, what do you think? Did Simon Peter accept the “hard saying” or not? Notice that the dialogue is not about what Jesus taught, but who Jesus is. “Do you also want to leave?” “To whom shall we go?” “To whom shall we go? You have the words of eternal life.” And so, maybe, Peter found the saying just as hard as everyone else did. And maybe he stayed for another reason, and not because he accepted the hard saying.

Most scripture scholars believe that the writer of John’s gospel had access to probably both the gospels of Matthew and the gospel of Luke. That would seem a natural thing to us, but to the ancients it would not have been. First of all, in the first seventy years of Christianity, the Christian settlements around the Mediterranean basin were far separated from each other. And although the Roman roads were good, and there was access to the sea lanes, it was hard to get information from one place to another, and it took a long time. Secondly, writing was expensive and rare. And so, for a community to have a complete copy of one of the gospels, would have been a treasure. And so, if John had access to Matthew and Luke, that would have been a wonderful thing. And the reason why they think he did is because it looks, to most people, when they take each gospel as a whole, that John is responding to some of the great stories in Matthew and Luke, and turning those stories to his own purposes, to say something new, to say something different, to a different audience.

Nowadays, when we have long-lasting television series, things like NCIS and CSI and The Big Bang Theory, over the course of those series, in order to keep the stories fresh, the writers take some of the people who had only a backstory at the beginning, and they bring that arc forward. It’s also done in novels; with the novels done within the bindings of one book. And so, what we have in John’s gospel, is the bringing forth of different aspects of the story. And, in John’s gospel, St. Peter, until the very end, is a minor character. In John’s gospel, Andrew brings his brother, Simon, to meet Jesus. And right there at the first meeting, not when Peter makes his solemn profession of faith in Caesarea – “You are the Messiah, the Son of God” – right there, in the very beginning, Jesus says to him, almost with a chuckle, “You’re Simon, and from now on I’m going to call you Cephas,” which is rendered Peter. And that’s the end of it.

Peter never speaks again until today’s story. He never speaks again until the story at the Last Supper, the washing of the feet. And there too, Peter’s dialogue with Jesus is rather deflating. Jesus is going around the room with a pitcher and basin washing his friends’ feet, a common Jewish custom but mostly done by servants. And Peter says, “Are you going to wash my feet? Oh, no, no, no. You can’t do that.” And Jesus says to him, “If I don’t wash you, you’ll have no part with me.” The Peter overreacts and says, “Well, if that’s the case, then wash all of me.” And Jesus says, “No. Those who have bathed have no need except to have their feet washed.” Then John tells us He said that because He know that His betrayer was in the room. That washing of the whole self is probably John’s reference to the sacrament of Baptism as practiced in the early church. So this is a dialogue not simply between Peter and Jesus, but between all the followers of Jesus and those who lead the church at the turn of the first into the second century.

The next time meet Peter is a couple of hours later, when he forcefully denies that he knows Jesus three times. Now, the interesting thing is that, in the other gospels, Peter plays some significant part in the resurrection story, but not in John’s gospel. When Jesus appears in the upper room on Easter night and says, “Peace be with you,” Peter is never mentioned by name, just all the disciples in a locked room. As a matter of fact, if you think of it, the star of that story is Doubting Thomas, not Peter. Peter only appears again in a postscript that was written afterwards, a second ending of John’s gospel, where the story goes that the disciples have returned - like the people in today’s gospel - have returned to their former way of life, they’re out fishing. Jesus is supposedly on the shore. He calls out to them, “Did you catch anything?” “Nah, we didn’t get a thing.” “Toss your nets over that way and you will.” Then Peter recognizes that it’s Jesus who’s speaking as the fish flow into the net. Jesus has breakfast prepared on the shore, and after breakfast He confronts Peter. He says, “Do you love me, Simon, son of John?” He doesn’t even call him by his nickname. “Do you love me, Simon, son of John?” And Peter says, “Yes, Lord. You know I love you.” “Then feed my sheep.” “Simon, son of John, do you love me?” Peter says, “Lord, you know that I love you.” “Well then, feed my lambs.” Third time: “Simon, son of John, do YOU love ME?” And Peter’s exasperated. Then he says, “Lord, you know everything. You know I love you.” He simply says, one more time, “Feed my sheep.”

Then, there’s the most deflating end of the story. Peter looks around and sees the other disciple. And Peter says to Jesus, “What about him?” And Jesus says to him, “Suppose that I want him to stay until I come back? What business is that of yours? You are to follow me.” That’s how the story ends.

What we see here, in this whole arc that John has created for Peter, is a very different Peter from the one we think we know in Matthew’s gospel and Luke’s gospel. We see here a person who is indecisive, and insecure, but who doesn’t know what else to do except to continue following Jesus.

Many of us have been raised to believe that Catholicism requires that you believe the church teaches, all the time. That’s simply not possible. The human mind was not created in such a way that it could grasp everything with the same degree of certitude all the time. And so, times will come in our lives when we are troubled by this, that, or the other doctrine of the church. There are times in our lives when we feel less devoted to our faith. But we have no place else to go. Jesus is still Jesus. The cross is still the cross. The resurrection is still the resurrection. And we are stuck with those things that we do not feel we can abandon.

That’s the point of today’s story. In all of our trials, in all the challenges to faith that come along, it is not certitude that’s required, but something else entirely. Notice what Jesus says to Peter when He asks him three times, “Do you love me?” He doesn’t say, “Do you now agree with everything I’ve taught?” No, no. “Feed my lambs. Feed my sheep. Follow me.” It is service that makes the difference in Catholicism, not certitude.