Among the many wonderful paradoxes of Catholic faith, practice and history is that now-canonised saints did not always act so saintly. From St Monica’s alcoholism to St Athanasius’s irascibility to St Jerome’s chronic ill-temper, the tradition is replete with examples of inconstancy. It is perhaps not an accident that the earliest example of this phenomenon is St Peter himself. This rock upon whom the Church is built was as often an example of fickleness as steadiness.
The Gospel of St Mark is often attributed to a young companion and protégé of St Peter. Thus Mark is considered the closest to Peter’s own account of the life of Jesus. In the ninth chapter of the gospel, a man brings his demon-possessed son to Jesus in the hope that the boy will be healed. When the demon seizes his son, the man explains, it causes him to foam at the mouth, gnash his teeth, and go into rigid convulsions. The demon has attempted to kill the boy by both drowning and immolation.
In desperation, the father implores Jesus: “If you can do anything, have compassion on us and help us” (Mk 9:22). Jesus’ reply is surprising, if not even shocking: “If you can?!” “Everything is possible to one who has faith,” He says (Mk 9:23). Rather than to respond with compassion and understanding, Jesus seems to reply with scorn and contempt. The implication seems to be that, because the man began with “if you can”, he must lack faith. Sensing this, “the boy’s father cried out, ‘I do believe, help my unbelief!’” (Mk 9:24).
In a letter to a young university student struggling with his own faith, written in 1962, Flannery O’Connor called this “the most natural and most human and most agonising prayer in the gospels”. And, she added: “I think it is the foundation prayer of faith.” O’Connor is correct, I contend. The man’s response may be the most profound prayer in the entire Christian tradition. In six words (five in the Greek), the man crystalizes what it means to be on the journey of faith.
Faith is best described not in terms of the all-or-nothing brilliance of an on-and-off switch. Rather, Christian belief is more like the process of balky dimmer switch. The trajectory toward full illumination, even for the most faithful of us, is never without periods of enveloping darkness. Sometimes, even on an overall trajectory toward the fullness of light, there are periods of flickering, where darkness intrudes. Or, to use another metaphor, the flames of faith will sometimes diminish until the embers are revived by wind and fuel.
In her letter O’Connor mistakenly attributed the father’s prayer to Peter. While not precisely accurate, her error is understandable, both in terms of the probable provenance of Mark’s Gospel and the fragility of Peter’s own faith and faithfulness. At the very time that his faith was most under pressure, he failed spectacularly: “[he] began to curse and swear, ‘I do not know this man about whom you are talking!’” (Mk 14:71). Not just, “No”, but “Hell, no! I don’t know him!”
According to Mark’s account, Peter then returned to Galilee in despair – “he broke down and wept” – sometime between his denial and Christ’s resurrection. This sets up the dramatic paradox by which Jesus expressly and specifically reconciles Peter. After Jesus had emerged from the tomb, “a young man … clothed in a white robe” told the two Marys and Salome: “He has been raised; He is not here… But go and tell his disciples and Peter, ‘He is going before you to Galilee; there you will see Him, as He told you’” (Mk 16:5-7).
I think the author of Mark’s gospel very deliberately juxtaposes these crucial scenes from the Easter story. And I believe that they are best read by the light of the encounter of the demoniac’s father with Jesus. In both instances, doubt and fear crept in to people who had sincere but fragile faith in Jesus. Peter’s faith did not merely waiver; it seemed to collapse. But the white-clothed youth at the empty tomb knows something about him that we do not.
Despite Peter’s denial, the young man commissions the women to seek Peter out, because he knows his faith has not been extinguished. The light of faith in Peter, dim though it is, can be rekindled. He knows that Peter’s journey of faith is as inconstant and variable as anyone else’s, perhaps even more than most. But he also credits Peter with a grip on faith that has not quite been relaxed.
Thus the great paradox of Peter’s faith is an example for us all. The light of his faith flickered and fizzled. But it was not extinguished, and the risen Jesus sought him out to revive it. Peter’s journey of faith to sainthood was certainly not a direct one, and therein lies an Easter message for us all.
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