March 12, 2010 – Matthew 16:13-17:13

Once again, there is a lot in this very small section of the Gospel.  I will focus on just a few verses.  16:17 is a very important verse for Catholics.  I didn’t realize it until just recently.  I was listening to a couple of different things and they all related to this verse and the idea of God revealing things to the Church and the infallibility of the Pope on certain matters.

First, the idea of things we as humans can learn about the world around us on our own verses those things that are revealed to us by God.  I listened to a series talking about St. Thomas Aquinas and his studies on philosophy.  I never really thought about the difference or I thought I had missed the point of the whole lecture until I read this and started to think about it.  Peter’s statement is not something he figured out on his own.  The idea that God would become man and dwell among us in the form of His only Son, that notion is not something we can determine on our own.  That is something that must be revealed to us by God.  There are many things about religion that can be shown through our own knowledge.  This is commonly known as natural law.  But most of the keys to our religious beliefs are things that cannot be proven by our own knowledge and seem preposterous if only seen from the limits of human knowledge. 

Those things we believe are things given to us through revelation.  This is what was given to Peter.  God revealed to Him who Jesus was so that he could make this proclamation.  This gift of revelation by Peter is a piece of the argument for the Pope’s infallibility when he makes certain statements.  We believe the God reveals truths to him, similar to what God did for St. Peter.  There is a lot more to Aquinas than that and I may throw some more in as I see it applying and as I continue to try and understand it.