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Glory and praise to you, O Lord Jesus Christ, as we celebrate today a most unique feast, the Chair of St. Peter your anointed leader of your Church here on earth. It is so unique especially in this time when we are so concerned where we sit - whether at home, in school, in offices, in churches, and in buses and planes - everywhere! because every seat is about position, rank, power and convenience, always having the "keys" so to speak. Sadly, as we seek the comfort of our "asses", we have forgotten that more important than where we seat is where we stand. Remind us, dear Jesus, on this Feast of the Chair of St. Peter, especially us your priests of that beautiful example you have shown at the Last Supper when you left your seat to wash the feet of the Apostles. How sad and shameful, O Lord, when we your priests fail to realize that the throne of the Eucharist is not a seat of power or prestige but a seat of loving service to everyone. St. Ignatius of Antioch said it so well in his Letter to the Romans (year 110) that the Primacy of Rome is the Primacy of Love because primacy in faith is always primacy in love, two things we can never separate.
May we all heed the call of St. Peter, the designated “owner” of that Chair, that we “Tend the flock of God in your midst, overseeing not by constraint but willingly, as God would have it, not for shameful profit but eagerly. Do not lord it over those assigned to you, but be examples to the flock” (1Pt.5:2-3).
Lord Jesus, as we grow deeper in faith, make us more loving too! Amen.
