Last week we welcomed the Word of God as a cure and light for us who build up this community of the Church, the community so dear to our Blessed Lord. It was the cure for the mentality we acquire while immersed in the world around us. We don’t want to run away from the world but we don’t want to transmit the worldly mentality into the Church either. Jesus calls us to be a different community in the midst of the world. That’s why the Word of God from last Sunday about the fraternal, patient correction aiming at winning back our sinning brother or sister came to us as a cure for our relationships within the Church. This different dynamic of our community as disciples of the Lord needs also divine light in order to grow stronger and stronger in faith which draws us closer to the Lord but also draws us closer to each other.
            The Word of God which comes to us this Sunday is full of hope for us. Once again we see Peter on whom Jesus promised to build his Church, his ecclesia.  It is important for us to observe Peter. We don’t spy on Peter but by witnessing Peter’s journey in faith we are drawn to the grace which transformed the Apostle. That’s why the Church is built on Peter. In Rome there is this magnificent Basilica called St Peter’s Basilica in the Vatican. Under the main altar, where the Pope celebrates Masses, there is Peter’s tomb. When it was discovered in the last century the archaeologists found an inscription saying: ‘Peter is here.’ Truly it can be said that this beautiful church in the Vatican is built on Peter. However with full conviction it can be also said that the Church, the Mystical Body of Christ where we are members, is built on Peter because the life giving Good News of Jesus Christ, the Saviour of the World, which we listen to, accept and venerate with love, faith and hope comes to us as the Gospel which challenged, formed and uplifted Peter too. This Gospel has run through the Apostle, through the first generation of the disciples of  the Lord – the early Church, through all the generations of Catholics which followed and us. The story of Peter is the Good News about the Holy Spirit at work in a human person.
            My Dear Sisters and Brothers! Today’s passage taken from the Gospel of Matthew may not come across as the most striking page of the Bible like some other pages when Peter is a participant of some wonderful and inspiring events pertaining to our salvation. However I invite you not to rush through in order to find something more exciting about Peter because these final verses of chapter 18 of St Matthew’s Gospel which we face this Sunday reveal some powerful work of the Holy Spirit in Peter.
            Firstly we witness Peter who speaks about some other person, who also followed Jesus, as ‘BROTHER.’ Don’t take it lightly. We get here a glimpse into Peter’s soul. He followed Jesus. He came to love Jesus. He admired Jesus. Following Jesus marked Peter’s soul, heart and mind profoundly. It marked him so profoundly that Peter’s family expanded and now included those who walked with Jesus too. Peter didn’t walked with Jesus alone. Peter wasn’t a stranger among strangers. Peter lived his love for Jesus, his faith in Jesus, his hope in Jesus in such a way that he was a brother among brothers and sisters. We are built on this Peter. I pray so that as you listen to this Gospel, which gives us a glimpse into Peter’s soul, may be graced to have the same experience, to realise that you are a brother or a sister among other Catholics who are your brothers and sisters. I pray so that you may discover the beauty and power of living your faith and love for Jesus as the gift which is a common gift of your fellow believers.
            Secondly, we witness Peter who experienced firsthand that the other brothers and sisters of him who followed Jesus weren’t angels. He says today: ‘How often must I forgive my brother if he wrongs me? As often as seven times?’ How realistic! Peter was wronged. Peter was hurt by another follower. However there is more. Look, the Gospel isn’t finished yet but Peter knows that in the Church there is no getting rid off sinners. The Church grows in her beauty not by eliminating sinners but by forgiving them. What Peter receives from Jesus was the grace to multiply the capacity of his heart and mind to forgive, not seven times but seventy seven times, which means always. After all he speaks to the Lord, the God himself. This Lord and Saviour doesn’t simply tell what to do, this Lord and Saviour gives us grace to fulfill what he says. We are built on this Peter. I pray so that as you listen to this Gospel, which gives us a glimpse into Peter’s soul, may be graced to have the same experience, to realise that the capacity of your heart to forgive is multiplied by the grace of the Lord.
            My Dearest Sisters and Brothers! How much hope for us and for our Church we find in the life of this man, Peter. He isn’t buried in the past. His story filled with Jesus Christ has become Good News for us. We are built on him.
            St Peter, we thank you for giving your life to the Lord and to us as well.
            St Peter, pray for us.

            The Living Word of God given to us this Sunday is a cure and a light for us who are members of the Church.
This Word of God is a Divine cure  because we have been called out of the world. This is what the word Ecclesia, which is translated as church, means: called out of. We have been called out of the world but we haven’t been removed from the world. Furthermore we still bear the common impact of the original sin which affected people’s relationship with God and with each other. That’s why today’s Word of God comes to us as a cure for what we bring to the Church coming from the world.
This Word of God is also a Divine light so that a new lifestyle, a godly one, could flourish in us and among us like biological life flourishes under the light of the Sun.
My Dear Sisters and Brothers! In today’s Gospel the word Ecclesia (Church) occurs twice. There is also one more occurrence. We heard it a couple of weeks ago when Jesus said to Peter: ‘You are Peter and on this rock I will build my Church.’ What did Jesus find in Peter that he made the Apostle such promise? It was the faith of the Apostle who confessed: ‘You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.’ The faith Peter had in Jesus was indicated by Jesus as the foundation of the Church.
In the Gospel we received two weeks ago Jesus showed the foundation of the Church. This Sunday Our Blessed Lord shows us the Body of the Church arising from that foundation. ‘Where two or three meet in my name, I shall be there with them.’ What these people have in common is their faith in Jesus ‘Christ, the Son of the living God.’ Therefore the Christians, who have been called out of the world, are not left in some vacuum. They are gathered in the community which Jesus called Ecclesia (Church). This new society arising from the foundation, which is the faith in Jesus ‘Christ, the Son of the living God,’ transforms women and men into sisters and brothers. All of us have been reconciled to one God. All of us have been washed in the same blood of the same Lord Jesus. The love of the Father and the blood of the Son made us one family of God.
St Cyprian of Carthage, a bishop and martyr, who lived in the third century, wrote: ‘You cannot have God for your Father if you do not have the Church for your mother.’ The Church allows us, who maybe strangers to each other, to be reborn into brothers and sisters who call the Heavenly Father: Our Father, who call his only begotten Son Jesus Christ: Our Brother. However these great mysteries we have been made partakers don’t hypnotize us. There is still a long process for us to undertake so that with profound conviction we could look at our fellow believers as our brothers and sisters. Jesus gives us a fascinating insight today when he says: ‘If your brother sins against you.’ The Lord doesn’t promise us that our fellow believers will be angels but he promises to give us grace so that in the sinful fellow believer we could still see our brother and sister whom we love out of sin, whom we love into holiness.
In the nineteenth century France was blessed having St John Vianney, a great pastor of the parish of Ars and a great confessor. Lots of people travelled to the little village of Ars to make their confession there because the holy priest could read people’s hearts. One day a bishop arrived. After making his confession before John Vianney he was walking away sobbing. Asked what happened he answered: ‘He told me to love my priests.’ St John became a brother to the bishop. He discovered that the bishop was lacking love for his priests but the way he said it to the bishop moved the man deeply. He didn’t feel condemned or judged but loved, encouraged and supported to embrace a change in his life.
My Dear Sisters and Brothers! I pray that when you go to confessions you can have this belief that there in the confessional room sits a brother of yours, a brother in faith. That your confession is witnessed by a brother who loves you out of sin and who loves you into holiness. That when you open your soul to him he will offer you a truthful and caring insight because he cares about your eternal life.