Sometimes things come together in unexpected ways. They did so for me last Sunday when a Gospel story, prison, World Youth Day and a petition to the Australian Bishops fell into place.
The story was from Matthew's Gospel where Jesus asked Peter what other people made of him, and then how Peter himself would describe him. When Peter answered that he was the Christ, the Son of God, Jesus replied that Peter would be the rock on which the church will be built. This text has come to underpin the Catholic understanding of the role of the Papacy.
I preached on this text in a prison. In that context the two questions Jesus asked appeared courageous. At the best of times, to ask close friends what other people think of us, and even more what they themselves think of us, takes courage. Our self-doubt and uncertainty whether the regard we have for our friends is fully reciprocated mean we will hang on the answer with some trepidation.
But if you are in jail you have only to read the tabloids and listen to shock-jocks to know what people think of you. You may be preoccupied with how you will be received when you leave prison. And your sense of shame and the disruption to your relationships with family and friends put enormous strain on your sense of self-worth. You would be very fearful of asking them what they think of you.
So this story spoke powerfully to the prisoners. It invited them to ask what and who mattered to them. The context of the religious service provides a space for reflection, allowing some relief from the wheel of harsh judgment, made by themselves and others, on which they are broken. Here it is possible to entertain the idea that they are precious to a God who loves each person passionately.
Still musing on the morning spent in the prison, I later caught a few minutes of the World Youth Day Mass telecast from Madrid. The aging Pope Benedict was reading a scholarly sermon on the same Gospel story. Hundreds of Bishops in white their mitres and thousands of priests in their white sun hats sat close by. Young people stretched back, some tired, some listening intently.
When Benedict referred to himself as the successor of Peter it was possible to see the historical and personal weight of the office and the way it might shape his