Day: June 29, 2025

“Blessed art thou, Simon son of John: for flesh and blood hath not revealed it unto thee, but my Father which is in heaven.”

The Feast of St. Peter and St. Paul commemorates the twin pillars of Christ’s Church. Their joint commemoration is itself a work of Providence. It draws together into one festival two prominent figures from the Scriptures of the New Testament, and a later tradition about their martyrdom and the subsequent translation of their remains to a common resting place in Rome. It suggests a spiritual connection between Scripture and Tradition; namely, how we think about what is received and given to us in Revelation.

The Feast of St. Peter and St. Paul places us with Christ in his body, the Church, but only insofar as it stands upon the Word of God revealed and written, hence the primacy of Scripture as the Revelation of the Word of God. Therein is the important connection. The preaching and teaching of Saul, renamed Paul, the Apostle to the Gentiles, is about the primacy of the Scriptures, “things written for our learning (ad nostram doctrinam)” about our life in Christ. This is the basis for the understanding of our life in the body of Christ, the Church, established by Jesus upon Simon, renamed Peter, the rock, upon which he will build his Church against which ”the gates of hell shall not prevail.” The Church is not primarily or simply a human or social construct.

This feast also marks the 40th anniversary of the ordination of Fr. John Park to the sacred priesthood, to his ministry within the sacred body of Christ. We are delighted and honoured to have him as our celebrant this morning. It speaks to all of us about our life in Christ. The ministry is nothing less than sacrifice and service, nothing less than the motions of Christ in him and for us. The ministry is not self-referential, not a celebration of individuals in their various skills and talents, but a reminder to all of us about our vocation to loving service in the body of Christ. “Let no man glory in men,” Paul tells us in the second set of readings provided for use in the Octave of this feast. Ordination is not about the person in the office but the office in the person. The office of Priest is the ministry of Word and Sacrament founded upon nothing less than the Word and Spirit of God. “Let a man so account of us, as of the ministers of Christ, and the stewards of the mysteries of God,” as Paul puts it.

And what is the Church? A building? A bishop? A congregation? A denomination? A parish? A diocese? A synod? A national church? No. Those at best are nothing more and nothing less than the outward expressions in one way or another and to some extent or another of “the one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church,” as we profess in the Creed. What we celebrate today with Fr. Park especially is that reality: the Church’s unity in God as Trinity, the Church’s holiness by the guiding light of the Holy Spirit, the Church’s catholicity in the fulness of the Faith, and the Church’s apostolicity as grounded in the mystery of Pentecost. In short, we are reminded of what we are called to be for that is the role and purpose of the ordained ministry of the Church. Forty years ago, John Park was ordained and enrolled in that understanding that reaches far beyond the mechanics and systems of our human devices. Father, remember that “thou art a Priest for ever” in the high priesthood of Christ, Tu est sacerdos in aeternum.

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