When Peter entered, Cornelius met him and fell down at his feet and worshiped him. But Peter lifted him up, saying, "Stand up; I too am a man." And Peter opened his mouth and said: "Truly I perceive that God shows no partiality, but in every nation any one who fears him and does what is right is acceptable to him." While Peter was still saying this, the Holy Spirit fell on all who heard the word. And the believers from among the circumcised who came with Peter were amazed, because the gift of the Holy Spirit had been poured out even on the Gentiles. For they heard them speaking in tongues and extolling God. Then Peter declared, "Can any one forbid water for baptizing these people who have received the Holy Spirit just as we have?" And he commanded them to be baptized in the name of Jesus Christ. Then they asked him to remain for some days.
Today's Song of Praise is taken from Psalm 98:
O sing to the LORD a new
song, for he has done marvelous things! His right hand and his holy arm
have gotten him victory.
The LORD has made known
his victory, he has revealed his vindication in the sight of the nations.
He has remembered his steadfast
love and faithfulness to the house of Israel. All the ends of the earth
have seen the victory of our God.
Make a joyful noise to the
LORD, all the earth; break forth into joyous song and sing praises!
Today's Epistle is from the First Letter of John, beginning at the 4th Chapter and the 7th Verse:
Beloved, let us love one another; for love is of God, and he who loves is born of God and knows God. He who does not love does not know God; for God is love. In this the love of God was made manifest among us, that God sent his only Son into the world, so that we might live through him. In this is love, not that we loved God but that he loved us and sent his Son to be the expiation for our sins.
+ A Reading from the Gospel of John, beginning at the 15th Chapter and the 9th Verse:
As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you; abide in my love. If you keep my commandments, you will abide in my love, just as I have kept my Father's commandments and abide in his love. These things I have spoken to you, that my joy may be in you, and that your joy may be full. This is my commandment, that you love one another as I have loved you. Greater love has no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. You are my friends if you do what I command you. No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all that I have heard from my Father I have made known to you. You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide; so that whatever you ask the Father in my name, he may give it to you. This I command you, to love one another.
Peter is portrayed talking
with Cornelius, a Roman Centurion whom he had converted to the Faith.
It has occurred to me to wonder what language they were speaking, for it
is highly unlikely that a Roman would know Aramaic or Hebrew.
The mention of the gift
of tongues a verse ahead might indicate that Peter was given the gift of
speaking Latin for Cornelius' benefit, but I think it more likely that
they were speaking Koine Greek, the "lingua franca" of the Eastern Mediterranean.
It is very likely that both Peter and Jesus spoke Koine -- the earliest
texts of the New Testament are in Greek, and many of the sayings of Jesus
work too well in Greek to be mere translations from the Aramaic.
Jesus and the Apostles are
sometimes portrayed as simple country bumpkins, illiterate and inchoate,
blank slates for the inspiration of the Holy Spirit -- as if bumpkiness
were a guarantee of purity and innocence. People who hold this idea
have obviously never met country folk.
Peter's Epistle in the New
Testament is pretty rough Greek, with many obvious "Semitisms" -- turns
of phrase and use of words obviously characteristic of a native speaker
of Aramaic or Hebrew. It is not the work, however, of a simpleton
-- nor is Peter ever portrayed in the New Testament as such.
He is a dynamic figure,
full of zeal and fire, who [preaches to multitudes and converts them by
his sheer force of personality, as well as his tongue. Of course,
some of this was due to the inspiration of the Spirit at Pentecost, but
Peter shows signs all through the Gospels of being a dynamic (if sometimes
confused) leader.
To be a full member of a
Jewish congregation today, a boy must demonstrate that he can read from
the Torah, and I see no reason to doubt that the same was true two millennia
ago. Both we and modern Rabbinic Judaism grow out of the Pharisaic
tradition of letters and learning that produced Paul.
Jesus reads from the scrolls
of the Prophets in the Synagogue in Capharnaum; at age 12, he disputes
with the lawyers and scholars in the Temple. When the Gospel does
record him speaking Aramaic -- "Maranatha" when he raises the dead girl,
and "Eli, Eli, lama sabachthani" on the Cross, it always carefully translates,
whereas most of His direct speech is simply reported: "Amen, Amen,
I say unto you . . ." (Amin, Amin, Lego umin... in Greek -- marvelous rhythmical
rhyme).
St. John's Greek, in both
his Gospel and his letters, is good -- with a few Semitisms. The
Apostles, following their Master, were well-read and well-educated men,
not simple bumpkins. They knew what they were talking about, and
could explain it to the nations around them easily and fluently.
Jesus told them to: "Go
forth and teach all nations.."; Paul made his Apostolate a ministry
to the Gentiles; here, Peter says: "Truly I perceive that God
shows no partiality, but in every nation any one who fears him and
does what is right is acceptable to him." The Church offers salvation
to all peoples, regardless of color or nationality or class.
We have done fairly well
at evangelizing almost everyone over the years -- I seriously doubt that
there is anyone, anywhere, who has not heard at least something about Christ
and His message -- however garbled it may be. We are sometimes better,
and sometimes worse, at evangelizing ourselves, and allowing the Spirit
to speak through us to the people in our immediate vicinity -- it is always
much easier to go out to strangers, and tell them what to believe, than
it is to change our own habits and quirks.
The other theme in the Reading
is the "gift of the Holy Spirit" -- tongues, prophecy, discernment, and
ecstasy. We hear about this phenomenon in the Gospels, and in the
Epistles, but soon after the death of John in 100 A.D., it seems to have
begun fading away, and by 200 is almost gone. It was resuscitated
around the turn of the 20th Century by various Protestant "Pentecostalist"
groups -- most notably the Azusa Street Group in Los Angeles in 1906.
I agree with the Protestants
and the Catholic Charismatics that we need to reclaim our Apostolic heritage
of the Gifts of the Spirit -- not in the Liturgy, however, but in ceremonies
of prayer and healing. Our Lord said that if we ask the Father, it
will be given to us -- we sometimes ask too little, or ask only for ourselves.
St. Francis of Assisi asked: "Make
me an instrument of your Peace...", and he was given that charism -- the
Franciscan spirit is still with us, over 800 years later. Franciscans
still speak for peace and love.
Sir James Jeans, a British
Physicist a century ago, said: "The Universe is not only stranger
that you DO imagine; it is stranger than you CAN imagine."
This is certainly true of God -- who is beyond human description or understanding
-- and we are nevertheless promised a participation in that strangeness,
that wonder by the Gospel.
We are given the power to
heal, and teach, and "speak to the condition of all men", in the wonderful
Quaker phrase. Not all are called to the sacerdotal, hierarchical
Priesthood, but we are all, alike, called to the priesthood of all believers,
expressing the Charism of the Church and her people in all times and all
places, among all sorts and colors and creeds of humankind.
We need to build structures
and occasions to express this Gift of the Spirit in our corporate lives
-- opportunities to spread the Grace and the Mystery that we are given
in Baptism and the Eucharist to all parts of the world -- even the lowest
and humblest and basest and most material. WE cannot do miracles,
but the Spirit assuredly can and does -- we need to make ourselves "lightning
rods" for the dynamism we are promised as part of the Faith received from
the Apostles, and from Our Lord.
Today's Song of Praise recalls
how the Lord has done marvelous things in saving and preserving Israel,
his chosen, beloved people. Would he do any less for His beloved
people that His Son won for Him?
"He has remembered his steadfast
love and faithfulness to the house of Israel." Will He remember
any less His love for us -- to whom he sent His only-begotten Son, and
to whom He and that Son sent the Comforter, the Paraclete, the Holy Spirit?
Of course not! Let
us sing praises, and rejoice, then in the knowledge of His love and Power!
Today's Epistle, from John's first letter, continues the idea of God's love -- He IS Love, and His love sent Christ into the world to redeem it for the Father, the force of that love is the Spirit that drives us and the Church through the centuries.
Jesus makes the same point, in today's Gospel -- the love of the FAther, His love, an our love, which is the only proper response tot he great outpouring of God's love and grace upon us. Jesus says: "...for all that I have heard from my Father I have made known to you..." -- there is no secret way, no "Royal Road" to salvation, but only the simplicity of love -- love of God, love of our fellow man, and (hardest of all, sometimes), love of ourselves. In that Love is the Power to do miracles . . .
Let us go forth, then, loving, praising and singing . . .
In the Name of The Father + And of the Son And of the Holy Spirit Amen.