“You are the Christ, the Son of the living God” (Mt 16:16). In these words, Peter, asked by the Master, together with the other disciples, about his faith in him, expressed the patrimony that the Church, through the apostolic succession, has preserved, deepened and handed on for two thousand years.
Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God: the one Saviour, who alone reveals the face of the Father.
In him, God, in order to make himself close and accessible to men and women, revealed himself to us in the trusting eyes of a child, in the lively mind of a young person and in the mature features of a man (cf. Gaudium et Spes, 22), finally appearing to his disciples after the resurrection with his glorious body. He thus showed us a model of human holiness that we can all imitate, together with the promise of an eternal destiny that transcends all our limits and abilities.
Peter, in his response, understands both of these things: the gift of God and the path to follow in order to allow himself to be changed by that gift. They are two inseparable aspects of salvation entrusted to the Church to be proclaimed for the good of the human race. Indeed, they are entrusted to us, who were chosen by him before we were formed in our mothers’ wombs (cf. Jer 1:5), reborn in the waters of Baptism and, surpassing our limitations and with no merit of our own, brought here and sent forth from here, so that the Gospel might be proclaimed to every creature (cf. Mk 16:15).
--Pope Leo XIV,
Homily, May 8, 2025,
the day of his election as Pope
Image source: El Greco, Saint Peter and Saint Paul (1590-1600), https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Saint_Peter_and_Saint_Paul_(El_Greco,_Barcelona)#/media/File:El_Greco_-_Saint_Peter_and_Saint_Paul_-_Google_Art_Project.jpg
Quotation source
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