Rehabilitation

Homily for Friday of the Seventh Week in Eastertide

Right now, many young people are graduating from college and high school. Most of them are looking forward to the future and have many ideas about how they can get ahead in the world. They are full of energy and enthusiasm. I can remember when I felt like that, and I daresay, so can you.

Eventually, all the young people who are graduating this year will come to a point in their lives where they are no longer looking for new opportunities and new ideas. They have settled into a routine and, in some instances, have found themselves more passive in approaching new things.

As they become still older and, perhaps, helpless, they may be able to do nothing at all but wait for the inevitable. There will come a day when they will look at their lives in a despondent attitude. They may even look at their approaching death as a release from misery. They are no longer active nor passive; they are simply waiting.

The Gospels portray St. Peter as a man who has gone through all of these stages of life. As we approach the final chapter of St. John’s Gospel, we find Jesus questioning Peter about love. “Simon, son of John, do you love me more than these?” Peter has answered the call that Jesus made back when he was a fisherman. He did so with some enthusiasm and with hope that Jesus would be the fulfillment of all that he believed.

Then came the tragic day when Jesus was arrested, put on trial, condemned, and executed. Unfortunately, Peter was caught in a dilemma when the maidens in the courtyard questioned whether or not he was a disciple of the Nazarene. Peter was scared. There is also the possibility that he was disappointed that Jesus had not been the man he thought he was. So rather than actively answering the question, he takes a passive route and denies Jesus. However, in the final chapter of St. John’s Gospel, Peter is rehabilitated. Once again he is full of energy and enthusiasm as he witnesses the resurrection of Jesus.

We all know that there is final day that will eventually come around. Jesus makes reference to this day as he speaks with Peter this final time. “…when you grow old, you will stretch out your hands, and someone else will dress you and lead you where you do not want to go." As Peter approached the end of his life some forty years after the resurrection, I’m sure that he looked back at his days of energy and enthusiasm, at the day when Jesus questioned him about his love, and about the years that he had spent preaching the forgiveness of sins at the direction of Jesus.

No matter where you are on the spectrum of life at this present time, we can look ahead with hope and with love of Jesus who has been an important part of our lives and who has used us to make his name known throughout our part of the world. The Letter to the Hebrews encourages us to run the race that is before us with the realization that Jesus is waiting for us at the finish line.