St. Paul in Everyday Life

Homily for the Solemnity of Saints Peter and Paul, Year A
Today, I’d like to introduce you to five people: Priscilla, Timothy, Lydia, Mark, and Jason. Let’s start with Priscilla.

Priscilla is a high school senior who is stuck in holding mode – she has applied to a few different colleges, but she knows that it will really be the scholarships or financial aid that determine where she will end up. And now, she is waiting, with her whole future dependent on acceptance letters and financial packages that will determine where she will spend the next four years of her life. The stress is becoming so unbearable that she can’t concentrate on her studies, or even on enjoying her senior year. But one thing does help; she remembers what St. Paul said in his letter to the Philippians: “Have no anxiety at all, but in everything, by prayer and petition, with thanksgiving, make your requests known to God. Then the peace of God that surpasses all understanding will guard your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus.” (Philippians 4.6-7) She’s still worried, but she places those worries in God’s hands, and she finds peace.

As they sit at the dinner table, surrounded by family and friends, Timothy and Lydia think back on the last fifty years of marriage; there certainly were good times, but there were struggles, too. What made it last? Each time someone asks them that question, they remember the words they heard on their wedding day, from St. Paul’s First Letter to the Corinthians, words they have tried to live out each day: “Love is patient, love is kind. It is not jealous, it is not pompous, it is not inflated, it is not rude, it does not seek its own interests. Love never fails.” (1 Corinthians 13.4-5a, 8a)

Lying in a hospital bed, it is the pain that consumes Mark more than anything else – an unbearable pain that not even the strongest medications can take away. Sitting next to the bed, Mark’s wife feels completely helpless – there is nothing she can do for this man she loves so much. It’s not fair for such a good person to be suffering so much. But, by the time they leave the hospital, they remember that our sufferings are joined with the suffering of Christ, that St. Paul said in his Second Letter to the Corinthians: “I will rather boast most gladly of my weaknesses, in order that the power of Christ may dwell with me. Therefore I am content with weaknesses, insults, hardships, persecutions, and constraints, for the sake of Christ; for when I am weak, then I am strong.” (2 Cor. 12.7b-10)

As a college student, Jason finds is hard to stay connected to his faith. And especially when you’re a college athlete, like Jason is, faith and church can easily take a back seat. All that talk about God – what does he have to do with my life? How can those church people think that the Bible can speak to me? But, one day, a friend shows Jason something that St. Paul wrote, in his First Letter to the Corinthians: “Do you not know that the runners in the stadium all run in the race, but only one wins the prize? Run so as to win. Every athlete exercises discipline in every way. They do it to win a perishable crown, but we an imperishable one.” (1 Cor. 9.24-25) And, you know, that sort of makes sense.

Today begins the International Year of St. Paul, a year-long celebration of the 2000th anniversary of St. Paul’s birth. Throughout the world, Christians will be spending this next year getting to know this apostle, missionary, and author better. St. Paul’s letters are some of the most practical writings in the whole Bible. He experienced firsthand weakness, love, anxiety, and disillusionment as he preached the gospel, and he wrote about these things – these very human experiences –to remind us how God meets us in these very emotions. People like Priscilla, Lydia and Timothy, Mark, and Jason, people like you and me, can find in St. Paul’s writings strength and wisdom for our Christian journey. St. Paul is relevant today because he still speaks to us and shows us the way to Christ through our very humanity. St. Paul teaches us what it means to be a Christian. Our hope during this coming year is that we can spend time reading his words and learning about his life so that we, too, can become better Christians. For, as Paul said to the church in Rome, we are “not ashamed of the gospel. It is the power of God for the salvation of everyone who believes.” (Romans 1.16).