Monday of the Fourth Week of Easter

Lectionary: 279

I also heard a voice say to me, ‘Get up, Peter. Slaughter and eat.’ 
But I said, ‘Certainly not, sir,
because nothing profane or unclean has ever entered my mouth.’ 
But a second time a voice from heaven answered,
‘What God has made clean, you are not to call profane.’ 

 P eter's vision of a sheet filled with unclean animals coming down from heaven is recounted twice in Saint Luke's Acts of the Apostles. It may be the most important, unexpected, and significant incident in the book. The disciples had not imagined that Jesus's commission to announce the gospel to the world included the gentile world. He might as well have included the birds of the air (Saint Francis) and the fishes in the sea (Saint Anthony!) 

We should also remember the visionary's reluctance to see what he was seeing, or to hear what he was hearing, as he replied to the Voice:

"Certainly not, sir. For never have I eaten anything profane and unclean.” 

Eating unclean meat was unthinkable to any devout Jew; and in all his years of following the Galilean the subject had never come up. The vision came three times and was resisted three times, and we know that number is always significant in the Bible. Third means completely, as in Jesus' plea in Gethsemane and his sojourn in the tomb. There could be no doubt that the Christian missionaries should give up their reluctance to share table fellowship with gentiles if they were to complete their mission. 

Saint Luke adds to the drama as he recounts the amazed horror of Peter's colleagues in Jerusalem: 
    "You entered the house of uncircumcised people and ate with them!”

Nor did he brush off their amazement with a defensive remark like, "What of it? It's no big deal." It was a big deal. It might have been an iceberg to the Lord's Titanic on the Church's maiden voyage! 

And so he "explained it to them step by step." He recounted the entire vision including the fact that it occurred three times. And he described in detail the arrival of men from Joppa, his going with them. his preaching to devout gentiles, and their receiving the same Holy Spirit which had filled the Cenacle on that Pentecost. There was no doubt in his mind; there should be none among the Apostles in Jerusalem. 

And with their acceptance of Peter's testimony, the nascent Church accepted both the gentiles among them and the leadership of the first Pope -- although he had made a course-changing decision that was completely unexpected. In retrospect they would remember the teachings of the prophets, especially Isaiah, about receiving gentiles; and the blessing that Abraham's descendants should be to the entire world. If they had never supposed that the Patriarch's blessing included inclusiveness, it was time they supposed it! 

Popes can do that. Ordinarily, we do not expect course changes from the papacy. Its primary purpose is to keep the Church on course amid the changing currents of a dynamic planet. But sometimes he must take us out of the harbors of our safe places to announce the Gospel to the least among us, especially those who have not found the Church to be a safe place. 

Sinners are welcome among us. No one knows that better than sinners like you and me! And as we have found both welcome and a way out of our sinful beliefs, tendencies, desires, and habits so must all those who put their faith in the Lord. 

Yes, it gets turbulent at times; and divisions arise that should not occur. God is still in charge and how all this conflict will be resolved we cannot imagine. But all things will be well, and all things will be well, and all manner of things will be well.