Refuting the attack on Petrine Primacy from today's Gospel Reading

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The Gospel reading for today made me think of something that I have heard people say in attempting to refute Petrine Primacy (and through it the authority of the church).

Often they say that Jesus meant that He would build His church upon the confession that Peter make at that time (Matthew 16:16-19) and not upon Peter himself as chief apostle (and defacto first Pope). I deal with this somewhat in This post , but today’s Gospel says something that I think is significant. Here’s the text:

Matthew 14:22: Then he made the disciples get into the boat and go before him to the other side, while he dismissed the crowds.
23: And after he had dismissed the crowds, he went up on the mountain by himself to pray. When evening came, he was there alone,
24: but the boat by this time was many furlongs distant from the land, beaten by the waves; for the wind was against them.
25: And in the fourth watch of the night he came to them, walking on the sea.
26: But when the disciples saw him walking on the sea, they were terrified, saying, “It is a ghost!” And they cried out for fear.
27: But immediately he spoke to them, saying, “Take heart, it is I; have no fear.”
28: And Peter answered him, “Lord, if it is you, bid me come to you on the water.”
29: He said, “Come.” So Peter got out of the boat and walked on the water and came to Jesus;
30: but when he saw the wind, he was afraid, and beginning to sink he cried out, “Lord, save me.”
31: Jesus immediately reached out his hand and caught him, saying to him, “O man of little faith, why did you doubt?”
32: And when they got into the boat, the wind ceased.
33:** And those in the boat worshiped him, saying, “Truly you are the Son of God.”** (Emphasis mine)

Now if the confession is what Jesus wanted us to believe was the foundation of the church, then why didn’t He say so right here? The confession is essentially the same as Matt. 16:18 (16: Simon Peter replied, “You are the Christ, the Son of the living God.”)

The CA ma(name removed by moderator)age has other great tracts on this topic here .

This whole argument against Petrine Primacy just doesn’t work for me because it twists the passages in question and requires mental gymnastics to believe it.
Pax vobiscum,
 
Those are all good points. I converted from Protestantism and what opened my eyes to the truth of Peter’s being our first Pope were the actual words of Jesus:

And so I say to you, you are Peter, and upon this rock I will build my church, and the gates of the netherworld shall not prevail against it. Matt 16:18

I knew that “peter” means “rock”, so Jesus must have meant Peter the man, not “the faith of Peter” as I was so often told as a Protestant. Amazingly for me, God took me through a time of practicing Fundamentalism before I converted to Catholicism. I think I learned to trust the Literal Sense of the Scriptures from the Fundamentalists… if that makes sense. and I remain grateful to them for that.

peace–
magdalisa
 
Good point. I’ll have to store this away for future use.

While a Protestant, whenever I read the passage in which Christ ordains Peter, essentially, I never really got the impression that it was talking about his confession, like some claim. I more or less accepted the Catholic teaching without knowing it was Catholic teaching. After that, I just never thought about its implications. Sort of how I pretended that John 6 didn’t exist.

God bless.

+Joel
 
The primacy of Peter is based on 2 things: Jesus choosing him for that position and Peter’s faith which he expressed in the reading you cited. So actually, it is both not either/or, as our Protestant brethren would have us believe who seem determined to ignore whatever might support Jesus’ choice of Peter as the Shepherd of the Shepherds of God. There is plenty of support for Peter’s primacy in the Scriptures as well as Tradition, including the Early Church Fathers.
 
I think the Gospel reading shows that Jesus does not require perfect men to be leaders of the Church. Peter was no paragon of virtue (“Depart from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man”). He was not particularly enthuastic about being part of this ministry. He was not terribly bright. His faith was not always firm.

And, yet, this imperfect man was the one that God chose.

Somehow it seems that the God born in a stable would have it no other way.

The path of irony is often the path to God.
 
Great insight Michael! That’s fascinating…

The material within the Gospels is not necessarily within its correct chronological sequence, so we can’t know for sure if the events of Matt. 14 precede those of Matt. 16. Still, it raises a very great number of questions regarding what was original/unique about Peter’s confession. Perhaps the fact that no miracle preceded his reply is unique (implying a truly divine revelation at that moment). It is interesting to note, however, tht Christ & Peter are the stars in both stories: Matt 14 & 16.

At the very least,you are correct in asserting that Matt. 16 is a PETRINE passage. Attempts to reinterpret its significance (as focused merely on the believer’s confession of faith, and not primarily on Peter) stumble all across the text. Christ asks the disciples to reveal His identity. Peter does. In turn, Christ reveals Peter identity. 'Twere it not for the Papal implications of this passage, no Protestant would dispute its Peterine character.

God bless you,
+Hugo
 
Sgt Sweaters:
Good point. I’ll have to store this away for future use.

While a Protestant, whenever I read the passage in which Christ ordains Peter, essentially, I never really got the impression that it was talking about his confession, like some claim. I more or less accepted the Catholic teaching without knowing it was Catholic teaching. After that, I just never thought about its implications. Sort of how I pretended that John 6 didn’t exist.

God bless.

+Joel
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Hi Sarge!

Y’know that is pretty much my experience as well because even when I was away from the church, these passages just seemed to say what they say and I can never get into the mental gymnastics that it takes to defy the plain text of it.

Sunday’s gospel just sort of got my wheels turning…

I was also impressed by the fact that the OT reading dealt with the fact that God was not in the fire, wind, or earthquake, which reminded me of all the hurricanes we have had here in Florida as well as the Tsunami and the earthquakes and fires all over the world…but God is not necessarily speaking to us from these things, (though they certainly tend to turn our attention towards Him). Look what the passage says…(1st Kings 19:11-12)
" 11 Then the LORD said, “Go outside and stand on the mountain before the LORD; the LORD will be passing by.” A strong and heavy wind was rending the mountains and crushing rocks before the LORD–but the LORD was not in the wind. After the wind there was an earthquake–but the LORD was not in the earthquake. 12 After the earthquake there was fire–but the LORD was not in the fire. After the fire there was a tiny whispering sound." (Emphasis mine)

We hear the voice of the Lord in that “tiny whispering sound” inside our very souls.
Pax vobiscum,
 
There are several thoughts I have concerning the passage of this thread, and hopefully I won’t jumble them all together.

First, I don’t think this passage really has anything to do directly with Peter and the Petrine Ministry. Peter’s confession Matthew 16 is in a different set of circumstances.

Matthew 16 was dealing with the Apostles and people in general response to the death of John the Baptist and how this was effecting Jesus’ ministry. Jesus put a very direct question to the Apostles about who others thought Jesus was and who the Apostles thought Jesus was.

From this came Peter’s confession which was different than the other Apostles, and in a verse I think is too often over looked is Jesus’ statement that Peter was able to say what he said, not because it was a reasonable thing to say considering what he had witness. No Jesus said it came through the revelation of the Holy Spirit.

It is imperative to realize the implications of Jesus’ statement because what He was ordaining Peter to a particular Ministry for the Church. Why? Because it was Peter,alone, who had received charism of the Spirit to make that proclamation. And it should be noted that Peter, in Acts was guided by the grace of the Holy Spirit to accept that no food was unclean thus opening the way for the Church’s mission to the Gentiles beginning with the Baptism of Cornelius and his house hold.

Eventually this lead to Paul’s missionary activity which lead to the Council of Jerusalm(headed by James). Peter never once fell back to a position of “Authority” as given him by Jesus in Matthew 16. Rather, Peter’s authority was based on a charism of the Holy Spirit.

In contrast, Matthew 14 has to be understood in light of its preceeding chapters. Before the boat incident, we find Jesus proclaiming that the Kingdom of Heaven (God) was present and active here and now and in the unique way in the person of Jesus.
From this Jesus demanded that his followers respond with their whole being to the Kingdom. We find this especially in his parables leading up to Matthew 14.

About Matthew 14 directly, a little cultural background. It was a universally accepted fact, by 1st century Palestinian Jews, that the sea/lakes were a special domain of the Devil. This should be pretty easy to appreciate especially considering the violent strorms that would (and do) come up suddenly and the peoples explanation for them given their lack of understanding of science.
Simply, it was the work of the devil.

If the lake was a special domain of the devil, Jesus’ walking on and calming the water was a clear sign of his dominion over the devil or in other words the Kingdom of Heaven (God) being present and active here and now in the person of Jesus.

Such a sign demanded a response and Peter gave his by jumping in and walking on the water. Sure he floundered, but remember Peter and the Apostles hadn’t experience Pentacost. Their response giving homage to Jesus, was a communal and natural response considering what the Apostles had just experienced.
 
Interesting Tome,
However, the point I’m making is that the profession by all the apostles is the same and yet only Peter gets the other one, the one that carries the ordination.

Your point is well taken though and I didn’t know that about the superstitions of the Jews at that time.
 
Michael, I think we are both on the same page. Again, about Peter’s confession, the thing I wanted to stress was Jesus’ stating that it was the Holy Spirit who was inspiring Peter’s thoughts and proclamation and it would be the Holy Spirit who would be guiding Peter in a special way through out his apostolic mission and his special ministry to the Church, we call the Petrine Ministry and thus through Peter his successor up to and including our present Pope.
 
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