In less than two weeks of Mass readings, the Apostles progress from cowardly deserters to bold proclaimers of the Gospel.
In particular, Peter goes from denying Jesus three times on Good Friday to admonishing the religious leaders proximately responsible for Christ’s crucifixion. I say proximately responsible, because all sinners bear responsibility for the redemptive death of Our Lord Jesus Christ (Catechism of the Catholic Church (CCC), nos. 597–598).
More to the point, Peter now remains firm in the face of suffering a fate similar to Jesus. Why? Because he’s seen the risen Lord. And been filled with the Holy Spirit at Pentecost. He’s not afraid of death anymore. He’s convicted about what awaits him if he holds fast to his faith in Christ.
“We must obey God,” Peter tells the leaders of the Sanhedrin, “rather than men” (Acts 5:29).
Candidate for Conversion
Peter also knows that the only irreformable enemies of the Gospel are the fallen angels (Eph. 6:12), and therefore every human person on earth is a candidate for conversion, including his fellow Jews who rejected Jesus during his earthly ministry. Like Jesus from the Cross (Luke 23:34), Peter and the apostles seek the salvific good of their opponents, such is the joyfully liberating power of divine forgiveness:
“The God of our ancestors raised Jesus, though you had him killed by hanging him on a tree. God exalted him at his right hand as leader and savior to grant Israel repentance and forgiveness of sins. We are witnesses of these things, as is the Holy Spirit whom God has given to those who obey him.” (Acts 5:30–32)
To those who obey him.
A Choice
Then, as now, we all have a choice in the matter. Will we trust Jesus or not?
Which brings us to our Gospel reading, in which St. John the Evangelist lays out the grave consequences of our most important decision in life:
The Father loves the Son and has given everything over to him. Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life, but whoever disobeys the Son will not see life, but the wrath of God remains upon him. (John 3:35–36)
As Dr. Scott Hahn and Curtis Mitch summarize well in the Ignatius Catholic Study Bible New Testament,
Faith is exercised when we trust in God and entrust ourselves to God. Because faith involves both the assent of the mind and the consent of the will, it can never be a purely intellectual decision that exists independently of one’s behavior (Jas. 2:14–26). It is because faith and faithfulness are two sides of the same coin that the opposite of faith is not just unbelief, but disobedience (CCC 161, emphasis original).
So let us do our part as joyful missionaries of the Gospel, confident in Christ who gives us the power to love even those who persecute us for proclaiming the Gospel (Matt. 5:7–12, 43–48). And let us not lose hope for any, especially those who seem most obstinate in opposing Christ and his Catholic Church.
As a wise Jesuit is fond of saying, “Our job is sales. God’s is management.”
