The Gospel that we have today immediately follows those two significant healing miracles: the story of the healing of the man who was deaf and mute and the cure of the man born blind. Simon Peter and the other disciples would have their ears and eyes checked in the Gospel today. How have they heard and seen Jesus? They heard Jesus already preach about the Kingdom of God for countless times; they had already seen him performing quite impressive miracles, and they have already lived with him for quite some time already at this point. So, Jesus wanted to know if they were indeed paying attention and if they had already conquered their own spiritual
deafness and blindness. Jesus asked them, “Who do people say that I am?” And they replied, “Oh, some people think that you are John the Baptist, others think that you are Elijah.” Then he turned to them and asked them a very personal and powerful question, “But who do say that I am?” And Peter answered him, “You are the Christ.” The place where this story took place is significant in understanding the meaning of the story. We were told in the Gospel that it happened in Ceasarea Philippi. It was a town of an amazing history. In the old days, it was called Balinas because it had once been a great center of the worship of Baal. It was also believed in Greek mythology that it was the birthplace of the Greek god, Pan, the god of nature. From the cave in the hillside gushed forth a stream, which was held to be the source of the Jordan River. And, further up on the hillside of this city was a temple of white marble, which Philip, the ruler of that time and the son of Herod the Great, built in honor of Ceasar, the ruler of the world, who was also considered a god. Thus, the name Ceasarea Philippi. The point is: Casearea Philippi was a very important city for centuries as the capital of pagan worship.
It is quite interesting and amazing that it was in this city, with its rich and prestigious religious background, which was once the capital of pagan worship, where Peter proclaimed Jesus as “the Christ, the Son of the living God.” Yes, it is Jesus who is the true God — not Baal, not Pan, and not Ceasar.
The perfect image of God is revealed to us in the person of Jesus, who has consistently shown us that to know God doesn’t mean having perfected our relationship with him. Look at Peter in the Gospel today. Just a few minutes after professing his faith in Christ and after praising Peter of his faith, Jesus was telling him, “Get behind me Satan.” Christian life can be likened to the dynamics of the faith of Peter. There is no question that he believes in Christ, but he really was in the process of knowing what this faith truly involves and what it truly means. There are ups and downs — we struggle; sometimes the teachings of the Church are hard to follow; we question; we analyze — but in the end, the most important thing is our faithfulness to God because if we are genuinely searching for the truth, there is no other way but to find ourselves in God’s presence. And one will find himself or herself at this point if that person really has this personal encounter with God. Yes, we can learn about God, about Jesus in the bible, in many and countless reading materials, but all those things are only
secondary sources; ultimately one has to personally experience his love. With the proliferation of information available online or on the internet, it is so easy nowadays to find whatever we are looking for. If you type the word “Jesus” in Google, you will have 379,000,000 results in 30 seconds! It’s pretty amazing. But the answers that Jesus is looking for are not based on what we read or heard about him, but what we have experienced from him, with him and through him. This is the reason why his disciples stayed with him, because once we have that personal encounter with God, once we get to know him personally, no amount of scandals in the Church can shake our faith to the core and make us leave while, at the same time, working actively for the Church to be true to who she is, the Bride of Christ. Finally, this personal encounter with God should lead us to service. Faith is really not about contemplation and theoretical mastery of doctrines; in the end, it is about how we treat and regard oneself and other people. If you were with Jesus and disciples in the Gospel today, and he asks, “Who do you say that I am?”, what will you answer him? Is our answer consistent and seen with our own works?’
– Fr. Cary