April 15, 2021

3 Important apostles: Peter - James - Paul

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In addition to the many disciples Jesus had, at least 72 that Luke's Gospel says he sent on mission (Luke 10:1-24), Jesus had a closer circle of disciples called Apostle, or “person sent”. Although this number was 12, we do not know if Jesus had called one from each tribe of Israel.

If this were the case, it would prove that Jesus was looking for the restoration of Israel, but this was not the case. Jesus chose the twelve apostles from among his many disciples, without obeying any human criteria. From a human point of view, it seems that he chose them at random. But according to the proverb, "he who sees faces does not see hearts", whereas we only see faces, God sees the heart of each one, and according to that heart, Jesus would have chosen his twelve.

See, I am making all things new! (Revelation 21:5) – By choosing at “random" the twelve apostles, Jesus wanted to institute something new because, as he himself would say, "The kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people that produces the fruits of the kingdom." Matthew 21:43

Within the circle of disciples, we have the circle of apostles and inside this circle, we have yet another formed, by coincidence or providence, by three apostles. Peter, James and John are the apostles closest to Jesus, his inner circle who accompanies him to places where the others do not go, the only ones who witness the healing of Jairus' daughter, the only ones who climb the Mount Tabor of the Transfiguration with him, and the only ones who see him sweat blood and water in the Garden of Gethsemane.

Peter, James and John are, therefore, the triad of apostles during the evangelical times of Jesus' life, but they are not the only triad. Even without the physical presence of Jesus, with the Church now guided by the Holy Spirit, there were also three apostles who acted as pillars. They are Peter, James and Paul.

The same Peter of the gospels, in order to establish the continuity between Jesus and his Church as his mystical body, is also part of this second triad. The second is James, but not the same James of the gospels who is also known as the Greater, brother of John, both sons of Zebedee. This James is the younger, also known as the Lord's brother. Finally, the third in the triad of the early days of the Church is Paul, the great Paul of Tarsus, who had previously persecuted the Church.

On what do we base the existence of this second triad? From the book of the Acts of the Apostles, we see how the figure of Peter appears as the authority, if not effectively in the first Christian community in Jerusalem, at least morally, which inspires the community and calls it to unity. James, the Lord's brother, is the effective authority of the Christian community in Jerusalem, the first to be formed; this authority is felt at the Council of Jerusalem. Paul is the protagonist of almost the entire book of the Acts of the Apostles, with his three apostolic evangelization journeys.

APOSTOLIC TIMES: PETER – JAMES – JOHN
Peter of the evangelical times
Simon John would have been his name, since in Israel and still today in Semitic countries like Ethiopia, the son's surname is the father's first name. On some occasions, Jesus called Peter by his real name – when he first met him and gave him the nickname Peter (John 1:42) and later when he asked him if he loved him (John 21:15-17).

Peter, the other apostles, and in general, all the people who came in contact with Jesus experienced salvation, that is, health of body and soul, forgiveness of their guilt, and a change of identity that comprised at times even a change of name, a change in the way they saw Jesus, in the way they saw themselves and the way they saw the world around them. On the other hand, it is also through these relationships that Jesus establishes with the people he meets along the way that his true identity is revealed to us.    

Peter and Andrew, his brother
As Jesus passed along the Sea of Galilee, he saw Simon and his brother Andrew casting a net into the lake – for they were fishermen. And Jesus said to them, ‘Follow me and I will make you fish for people.Mark 1:16-17

The next day John again was standing with two of his disciples, and as he watched Jesus walk by, he exclaimed, ‘Look, here is the Lamb of God!’ The two disciples heard him say this, and they followed Jesus. (…) One of the two who heard John speak and followed him was Andrew, Simon Peter’s brother. He first found his brother Simon and said to him, ‘We have found the Messiah’ (which is translated Anointed). He brought Simon to Jesus, who looked at him and said, ‘You are Simon son of John. You are to be call Cephas’ (which is translated Peter). John 1:35-37, 40-42

Jesus calls busy people, people who already have a profession, not people who are doing nothing. It is said that if you want to ask someone for a favor, ask it from a busy person and not from one who is not, because the latter will invent a thousand and one excuses not to do it for you. The Gospel of Mark is famous for the word "immediately" that he repeats countless times.

There are opportunities in life that do not come twice. When the founder of the Consolata Missionaries, Father Joseph Allamano, decided to become a priest, his brothers tried to dissuade him by saying "Think harder and decide later"; he replied, "Jesus calls me today, I don't know if he will call me tomorrow.”

The shepherds were the first to visit the infant Jesus, but for his disciples, Jesus chose fishermen. A shepherd is only needed when there is a flock to keep and care for. Jesus did not have a flock yet, so he needed the skill of a hunter or fisherman first to attract people to himself and then to send them to draw others to his cause: the transformation of the world into the kingdom of God. In John's account, we see how Andrew does this with his brother Simon.

John's version of the call of the first disciples seems more credible and more historical than Mark's, although Mark was the first gospel to be written. Mark wrote his gospel for the Romans in Rome, so he purposely places more emphasis on Peter. In John's version, Andrew knew Jesus first because he was already a disciple of John the Baptist.

Peter - fisherman and sinner
When he had finished speaking, he said to Simon, ‘Put out into the deep water and let down your nets for a catch.’ Simon answered, ‘Master, we have worked all night long but have caught nothing. Yet if you say so, I will let down the nets.’ When they had done this, they caught so many fish that their nets were beginning to break. (…) But when Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus’ knees, saying, ‘Go away from me, Lord, for I am a sinful man!' (...) and so also were James and John, sons of Zebedee, who were partners with Simon. Then Jesus said to Simon, ‘Do not be afraid; from now on you will be catching people.’ Luke 5:4-6, 8, 10

Jesus fishes Peter in his imperfection even as a fisherman. Jesus does not seek out saints, because there are no saints before God. Jesus looks for sinners who are aware of their condition, and this is what being a saint means; a saint is not perfect, but is a person who recognizes his own imperfections. This quality, we find it already in King David, also a sinner aware of his condition.

Humility is the mother of all virtues; pride is the father of all vices. Whoever is humble lets himself be molded by God, like the child who lets the father guide his hand in writing his first letters. When I am weak, then I am strong, says St. Paul (2 Corinthians 12:10), when I am conscious of my fault, I obtain God's forgiveness; when I am conscious of my limitations, I let God’s power work in me and through me.

Peter is realistic about himself; he does not pretend to be who he is not, he accepts that he is a sinner in front of Jesus and weeps for his sinfulness when he denies him, seeking no justifications, explanations or excuses not before others, not before God and not before himself. He takes responsibility for his sin and weeps tears of guilt.

Later, Jesus gives him the opportunity to redeem himself by asking him three times if he loved him. And up to this point Jesus seems to be content with Peter’s best, giving up perfection, since by asking the question using the word "agape", the oblative love with which he loves us, he accepts that Peter loves him only with love of friendship, for he uses the word "philia". In other words, Jesus asked Peter, "Peter, do you love me?" and Peter answered, "I like you".

We are not attracted to people who hide their vulnerabilities, their complexes and feelings of inferiority behind their pride and boasting, showing themselves superior to others. Those who seek to show themselves superior often hide a sense of inferiority. Peter makes himself loved by Jesus and his companions because, despite being chosen from the twelve to lead, he does not hide his vulnerabilities, his condition.  

Peter's psychological profile - Sanguine
Warm, deep, dynamic, emotional, impulsive and vibrant; uninhibited and loquacious, but not just by words, decides and acts many times without thinking, but with courage; although deep down he is a fearful person, as a leader, he drags others with him.

He is open and free in his feelings and actions. Good communication and social skills, relates well with others. On the negative side, we stress the lack of willpower; emotionally unstable, explosive, impatient and selfish. Also, he is insecure, fickle, inconsistent and fearful. Because he is active, little is given to introspection.

Fickle and incoherent
Peter said to him, ‘Lord, why can I not follow you now? I will lay down my life for you.’ Jesus answered, ‘Will you lay down your life for me? Very truly, I tell you, before the cock crows, you will have denied me three times. John 13:37-38

Impulsive
Peter answered him, "Lord, if it is you, command me to come to you on the water." Matthew 14:28

Then Peter said to Jesus, ‘Lord, it is good for us to be here; if you wish, I will make three dwellings here, one for you, one for Moses, and one for Elijah.’ Matthew 17:4

Then Simon Peter, who had a sword, drew it, struck the high priest’s slave, and cut off his right ear. The slave’s name was Malchus. John 18:10

Braggart
Then Jesus said to them, ‘You will all become deserters because of me this night; for it is written, “I will strike the shepherd, and the sheep of the flock will be scattered.” But after I am raised up, I will go ahead of you to Galilee.’ Peter said to him, ‘Though all become deserters because of you, I will never desert you.Matthew 26:31-33

Egocentric, insecure, fearful
Then Peter said in reply, ‘Look, we have left everything and followed you. What then will we have?Matthew 19:27

And Peter took him aside and began to rebuke him, saying, ‘God forbid it, Lord! This must never happen to you.’  Matthew 16:22

But when he noticed the strong wind, he became frightened, and beginning to sink, he cried out, ‘Lord save me!' Matthew 14:30

Uninhibited and frank, obedient and eager to please
‘Master, we have worked all night long but have caught nothing. Yet if you say so, I will let down the nets.’ When they had done this, they caught so many fish that their nets were beginning to break. Luke 5:5-6

Primacy of Peter
Peter's role among the twelve was prominent; the earliest writings of the New Testament refer to him as the leader of the twelve and one of the first to see the risen Jesus (1 Corinthians 15:5). He was regarded by Paul and everyone in his time to be one of the pillars of the early Church movement (Galatians 2:9).

In all the gospels, Jesus differentiated Peter from the other apostles from the time he first met him. Having given him the nickname "rock" on which he was going to build his Church; this can be interpreted, as some Protestants do, as referring to Peter's faith on which, in fact, the Church was built. (John 1:42; cf. Mark 3:16; Cf. Matthew 16:18).

This interpretation would be correct if this was the only text alluding to Peter's primacy over the other apostles; but since this is not so, as there are many other texts that confirm this primacy, the name Peter indicates the function within the Church that was reserved for him and only him.

In all the mentions of the apostles, in the list of twelve, Peter always comes first; the Gospel of Matthew (10:12) expressly calls him the first. Peter, together with James and John, were the only witnesses to the resurrection of Jairus' daughter (Mark 5:37), the transfiguration (Matthew 17:1), and the agony of Jesus in the Garden of Gethsemane (Matthew 26:37).

Jesus preaches to the crowds from Peter’s boat (Luke 5:3), when he is in Capernaum, Peter's house is his own house (Mark 2:1-12), and among all the apostles' relatives Jesus cured only one: Peter's mother-in-law (Luke 4:38-44). Jesus tells Peter to pay tribute to the Temple for both of them (Matthew 17:27), exhorts him to sustain the faith of the other apostles after his own conversion (Luke 22:32); after the resurrection, he first appears to Peter, before appearing to the other apostles (Luke 24:34; 1 Corinthians 15:5). Peter almost always acts as the spokesman of the apostles who rarely speak directly to Jesus.

Peter was the only apostle who saw in Jesus something more than a prophet or the reincarnation of John the Baptist; the only one who affirmed that Jesus was the Messiah, the one expected by the nations (Matthew 16:17-19). Although this same power was also later given to the other apostles, it is significant that he first gave it to Peter directly and individually. To bind and unbind, in terms of the rabbinical terminology of the time, meant declaring to be in communion with the Church or to be excommunicated from it. Therefore, Peter not only had the function of teaching and supporting, but also the juridical function.

Peter's primacy is revealed in the gospels, even in episodes that portrayed this position in a negative light: the fear of sinking in the lake, (Matthew 14:30), the denial of the master, (Luke 22:54-62), the miraculous catch of the fish, (Luke 5:4-6, 8, 10), and even when Jesus called him Satan (Matthew 16:23).

Only those who do not want to see, cannot see; the denial of Peter's primacy, its importance within the college of the apostles, can only be done for ideological reasons to justify the Orthodox and Protestant churches.

When Jesus’ Mission was completed and he went to the Father, the Church which he himself had founded became his mystical body to continue his work of salvation from generation to generation till the end of time. As a body, for the sake of unity, can only have one head, it is only logical that the head of the Church be Peter as he was the head of Jesus’ disciples as we have seen.

For all that we know, Peter lived his last years, and breathed his last in Rome, the capital of the Roman Empire. According to St. Irenaeus (130-202) bishop of Lyon, and the historian Eusebius bishop of Caesarea Maritima in the year 314, Linus, a Roman mentioned in 2 Timothy (4:21) was appointed to be the second bishop of Rome by the apostles Peter and Paul.


The importance of Peter's primacy is the unity of the Church. "Each head, its own sentence," two authorities do not lead to unity, but to division. Monotheism, before being distinctive of the people of Israel, had been the policy followed by a pharaoh of Egypt in order to create greater cohesion among the peoples of the Nile. The existence of various gods, like the existence of various churches, is not conducive to harmony and peace, but to division and war. Religious wars can be worse than all other wars.

When we love only one God who is the Father of all, it is easier to see our brother in the other, no matter who he is. This same principle is in primacy of Peter. Jesus did not want several Churches, he founded only one, he himself prayed for the union of all Christians (John 17:20-23).

James and John sons of Zebedee
As he went a little farther, he saw James son of Zebedee and his brother John, who were in their boat mending the nets. Immediately he called them; and they left their father Zebedee in the boat with the hired men, and followed him. Mark 1:19-20

According to the first three gospels, Jesus called on the same day and at the same time four disciples who were two pairs of brothers. The former, Peter and Andrew, would be older than the latter, for they fished on their own; the second, James and John, would be younger because they were fixing fishing nets with their father.

The first pair of brothers were fishing, the second were fixing the nets. Both activities are important; one cannot fish without repairing from time to time the nets that break with usage. At first glance, it passes unnoticed that some were fishing and others were repairing nets, but I do not believe that this fact is in the gospel by chance, without any special meaning.

Fishing is an activity, fixing nets can be many things; it can be to pray, to meditate. Jesus abandoned the activity, went to quiet places, in the calm of the night or at dawn, to be alone with himself and with God his Father. Before beginning his public life, he spent 40 days and 40 nights fasting and praying. During his public life, before the most important moments, he prayed, he ended his life on Earth by praying. He taught his apostles to pray and exhorted them several times to do so in order not to succumb to temptation.

Fixing nets can mean the act of thinking, of programming the activity or even the study of fishing methods, of different nets and hooks for different types of fish. Every evangelical preacher knows that he has to adapt to the culture, age and idiosyncrasies of the people he preaches to, so that they understand the word.

One at the right and one at the left
James and John, the sons of Zebedee came forward to him and said to him, ‘Teacher, we want you to do for us whatever we ask of you.’ And he said to them, ‘What is it you want me to do for you?’ And they said to him, ‘Grant us to sit, one at your right hand and one at your left, in your glory.’  Mark 10:35-37

 In general, throughout the Gospel of Mark, the apostles do not come out looking good and these two, despite belonging to the inner circle of the twelve, are the ones that come out looking the worst. Even thinking that the kingdom Jesus was talking about was the restoration of the Davidic kingdom, Israel's independence from the Romans, their request does not make sense, since the two already belonged to the circle closest to Jesus; therefore, when this kingdom is to come true, they would sit one on the right and the other on the left.

The only viable explanation is that they wanted to dethrone Peter from his position of prominence over the twelve. The incidence is so shameful of the two brothers that Luke does not mention it in his gospel and Matthew puts the request coming out of the mouth of the mother of Zebedee's sons. It is most certain that they said it themselves and this is evident even in Matthew because Jesus does not respond to their mother, but to them personally.  

Whoever does not live to serve is not fit to live. The authority in Jesus is one of service, he said of himself that he came into the world to serve, not to be served (Matthew 20:28). And he also said that his position among the apostles was to serve (Luke 22:27). And to be clear, at the last supper he did one of the lowest services of that time, in washing the feet to his disciples; the act itself was so dramatic that the disciples never forgot it (John 13:1-17).

Jesus was a layman, he was neither a scribe nor a Pharisee nor a priest, and yet his contemporaries recognized in him having more authority than the priests, scribes and Pharisees (Mark 1:22). Whether democratically elected or appointed, for Jesus, real authority is that which arises from within the person, it is a charismatic and moral authority, it is not inherent to the position one occupies in society.

More important than the place we occupy in society is the way we occupy it. Respect for authority is no longer automatically granted, or inherent to the office, as it used to be, but must be earned; an elected or appointed authority without a moral authority does not earn the respect of the people, but its contempt.

On the other hand, we should not call anyone Lord, since we are all equal, there is only one Lord who is God. In a heteronomous morality, people uncritically follow rules, commandments, laws, configuring their lives according to norms outside of themselves.

The moral that Jesus preached is not heteronomous in following rules, but autonomous in following one’s own experience in life and his own moral conscience as the legislative and executive power. He even did so by breaking the law of the Sabbath in situations where his own conscience found that healing a sick person was of a higher order than observing the Sabbath.

James and John sons of thunder
John answered, ‘Master, we saw someone casting out demons in your name, and we tried to stop him, because he does not follow with us.’ But Jesus said to him, ‘Do not stop him; for whoever is not against you is for you.’  Luke 9:49-50

On their way they entered a village of the Samaritans to make ready for him; but they did not receive him, because his face was set towards Jerusalem. When his disciples James and John saw it, they said, ‘Lord, do you want us to command fire to come down from heaven and consume them?’ But he turned and rebuked them. Then they went on to another village Luke 9:53-56

In addition to Peter's nickname, Jesus also baptized the other two apostles who were part of the inner circle of his disciples as the "sons of thunder". It is not difficult to guess why Jesus chose this name for these two brothers. Fanaticism and intolerance have always been the temptation of those who believe they are the sole holders of the truth or the whole truth.

The Church understands that there are "Semina verbum", seeds of the Word of God in all religions. We are far from the "Extra Ecclesiam nulla salus", that there is no salvation outside the Church. There is no salvation outside of Christ, because Christ is the son of God who came to save all mankind. Whoever, even without knowing Christ, follows him as the way, the truth and the life, is an anonymous Christian, as Karl Rahner said. Christ did not come to establish a new religion, but he came to teach men to be men.

Christian and human are synonyms, so whoever is authentically human is authentically Christian. At the end of our life, we will be judged not by our confession, not by our identity, but by our works. In chapter 25 of Matthew’s Gospel, in the questions about the final judgment, there are no questions about the identity of the person, regarding what he or she is or was, but they are all related to what he or she did.

Contrary to the fanaticism of the sons of Zebedee, Jesus counsels to move forward, not to force people into conversion. It's enough that the other is not openly against me to be with me in some way. If he is not openly against me, if he tolerates me, in some way he is with me. The fanatical and intolerant version of this phrase says otherwise, "Whoever is not with me is against me".

God who created us without our consent does not save us without it. Human freedom is the powerlessness of the almighty God. Salvation is a free choice, it cannot be forced upon anyone; this is what we see from the beginning in Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and from the New Testament in Mary who freely said yes, but could have said no.

In the Gospels, the sons of Zebedee appear only few times separately. James never appears apart from his brother John, who appears without his brother James only twice, once in the episode we have already mentioned and then when he ran to the tomb with Peter and despite having arrived there first, he lets Peter be the first to enter.  

John, the son of Zebedee, is not the author of the fourth Gospel: none of the evangelists was an apostle of Jesus because the Gospels were written after the preaching of the apostles; the apostles preached and the disciples of these apostles wrote the Gospels.

Luke was a disciple of Paul, Mark was a disciple of Peter, and Matthew is also not the one who was a tax collector before becoming one of the twelve; he is most likely a scribe who converted to Christianity. John, the son of Zebedee, has always been presented to us as the beloved disciple, but today almost everyone seems to agree that the beloved disciple is not John and that he was not one of the twelve.

Of the three great apostles in the circle closest to Jesus, from the evangelical times, only Peter passes to the times of the New Testament and the first steps of the Church, being part of another triad, together with James the younger, the Lord’s brother and Paul. James, the son of Zebedee, was martyred by Herod Antipas in the year 44 (Acts 12:2), and ended up drinking the chalice he had desired to drink. John is probably the only one of the twelve who crossed the threshold of the first century, and died of old age.

In the end the sons of Zebedee failed to dethrone Peter, who turned out to be the continuity between the evangelical times and the times of the Acts of the Apostles. Zebedee's sons are still mentioned in this book, but no longer important; another triad formed, but the other two did not belong to the group of twelve. James the younger, the brother of the Lord, and Paul, a converted Pharisee.

FIRST CHURCH: PETER - JAMES - PAUL
History tells us that after a great charismatic, visionary founder of any movement, there is always a person who institutionalizes it, that is, who integrates it into the social and cultural reality of a place, at a certain moment of its history. If it were not so that charisma would be nothing more than a summer’s night dream that fades away as quickly as it appeared.

This task could not be carried out by simple fishermen who after Christ's death did not have a definite identity: while Jesus had criticized certain laws of the Jews, the apostles continued to follow them. Jesus had criticized the Temple, yet the apostles continued to frequent it daily, as the book of Acts tells us; they were incoherent and inconsistent, they reconciled the irreconcilable, the visits to the Temple with the celebration of the Eucharist in homes.

Without Saint Paul, who institutionalized the ideals of Jesus and gave them a theological consistency, perhaps Christianity would never had gained wings to fly otherwise. It would never have passed from a sect of Judaism, which, sooner or later, would end up being absorbed, supplanted or eliminated. And it was precisely the worst enemy of this new movement that turned out to be its best friend and savior: Saul of Tarsus.

This triad of the early Church, as the book of the Acts of the Apostles reveals to us, is not a more or less cohesive group like the first triad who lived together with the master. On the contrary, these three only know each other, since they live in different places and have different philosophies. Each of them plays a very important role in the first Christian communities.

Each of them is a leader in their own right, and the way each leads even caused some friction among themselves. Paul respects and accepts Peter as the leader of the Christians, but he does not spare him some criticism, and he is in clear confrontation with James, the Lord's brother.

James most likely does not accept Peter's leadership because, as he is from Jesus' family, he thinks by succession he should be the leader and, in fact, he is the leader of the first Christian community, that of Jerusalem. Peter is on the tightrope between these two and plays the balancing act; he recognizes Paul's overwhelming charisma and has a lot of sympathy for him; he proceeds with caution, respects or is afraid of James and tacitly does not seem disturbed by his leadership and figurative power.

Peter in the Acts of the Apostles
But Peter and John answered them, ‘Whether it is right in God’s sight to listen to you rather than to God, you must judge; for we cannot keep from speaking about what we have seen and heard.  Acts 4:19-20

In the Acts of the Apostles, we see what the Spirit can do for a person. We see Peter transformed into his best, less impulsive and calmer as the situation requires of him, since he was the mediator between two hurricanes; but on the other hand, we also see him more proactive and less fearful, disobeying the high priests and even accusing them of having killed Jesus of Nazareth (Acts 5:28, 50-42).

After the great speech on the morning of Pentecost, Peter seems to take Jesus' place, following in the footsteps of the teacher, preaching and healing as Jesus did. Peter's first act as leader was to appoint a replacement for Judas.

The early Church begins to extend its mission outside the surrounding of Jerusalem and when the apostles heard about Philip's successful preaching in Samaria, Peter and John went there to lay hands on the new Christians. Later, Peter travels to Lydda and heals a paralytic named Aeneas; then to Joppa, modern day Jaffa, and resurrects Tabitha, a woman who had just passed away and who used to help the poor a lot.

In Caesarea, he has a mystical experience that will help him guide the rest of the Christians in the decision made regarding the Gentiles at the Council of Jerusalem. This experience culminates in the baptism of a Roman centurion named Cornelius and his entire family.

By this time Herod began to persecute Christians, he imprisoned James the Great, and beheaded him as he had done to John the Baptist. Seeing that this pleased the Jews, he also imprisoned Peter for being the leader of the movement. However, by virtue of the Holy Spirit who guided the Church from the beginning, Peter was miraculously freed.

To escape Herod's jurisdiction, Peter returned to Jerusalem, under the direct jurisdiction of the Romans, as we know. In Jerusalem, Peter took refuge in the house of Mary, mother of the evangelist John Mark (Acts 12:12). Moreover, this seems to be the residence of the first Christian community, that of Jerusalem.

From what we know from Papias who wrote around the year 90, Mark, after having been a disciple of Paul for a short time, followed in Peter’s footsteps as his disciple and secretary, from Jerusalem, Antioch to Rome; therefore, his gospel written in Rome and for the Romans is a reflection of Peter's preaching.

James, the brother of the Lord
There were also women looking on from a distance; among them were Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James the younger and of Joses, and Salome. Mark 15:40

Among them were Mary Magdalene, and Mary the mother of James and Joseph, and the mother of the sons of Zebedee.  Matthew 27:56

Meanwhile, standing near the cross of Jesus were his mother, and his mother’s sister, Mary the wife of Clopas, and Mary Magdalene. John 19:25

If we compare these three accounts, we see three women named Mary at the foot of the cross: Mary, the mother of Jesus; Mary Magdalene; and Mary, the wife of Cleopas, who was also the mother of James and Joseph.

Mark and Matthew tell us that at the foot of the Lord's cross was Mary, mother of James the younger, John places Mary the mother of the Lord and Mary Magdalene at the foot of the cross and reveals the name of the other Mary, saying that she is the wife of Cleopas and also saying that she is the sister of Jesus' mother.

We can then conclude with all certainty that James is the Lord's cousin, not a blood brother: Jesus and James the younger are the children of two sisters. We know from Matthew (10:3) that James' father was Alphaeus, a Hebrew name, which in Greek translates to Cleopas, so Cleopas and Alphaeus are the same person.

What we know about James is that he is not only the leader of the Jerusalem community, but he is also the leader of one of the factions of Christianity: the Hebrew Christians opposed to the Hellenistic Christians, whose leader was Paul. James is also the writer of an emblematic letter that apparently opposes Paul's theology. He seems to accept that salvation comes from our faith in Jesus, but he peremptorily declares that faith without works is a dead faith (James 2:14-26).

Paul, the Apostle of the Gentiles
We can say that in the New Testament, after the Gospels, Paul is the most repeated name and undeniably the most important figure of the early Church. Chronologically, the first writer and the most long-winded is Paul with his letters. The Acts of the Apostles could well be called the adventures and misadventures of Paul the Apostle of the Gentiles, since like the Gospel of Luke, they were written by one of his disciples.

Paul's life can be recollected in the Acts of the Apostles and his letters, in which Paul mentions that he was a Pharisee of the tribe of Benjamin, his Jewish name was Saul (which was the name of the first king of Israel also from the tribe of Benjamin) born in Tarsus in Asia Minor. He was educated in the strictest observance of Judaism during his youth in Jerusalem by Gamaliel (Phil. 3:5-6; cf. 2 Cor. 11:22; Rom. 11:1, Gal. 1:14; 2:15).

At the same time, his roots are in Greek culture, especially with regard to philosophy and rhetoric. He is also a Roman citizen, a title that was obtained by his father and extended to the whole family. Paul is a man who lives between two or three worlds, familiar with Hebrew and Greek culture, as well as with Roman politics.

With a markedly choleric profile, Paul was instinctive and his intelligence was intuitive and cunning, very controversial, impulsive and conflictive. Although he was practically a contemporary of Jesus, he did not know him personally, neither before his death nor after, since he did not have, like the other apostles, a real experience of the risen Christ.

He was a persecutor of Jesus' movement until he had a mystical experience, an encounter with the same Jesus whom he was persecuting. Before his conversion, Paul used his strength and talent in favor of Judaism by terrorizing Christians. The same talents are used later to spread Christianity to the pagans.

Since he had been a persecutor of Jesus' movement, few believed in him and even thought he was a spy; however, Barnabas believed in him and so Paul began to put his skills of persuasion, previously at the service of Judaism, now at the service of Christ. The Acts speaks of Barnabas and Paul, but soon after it speaks of Paul and Barnabas and later only of Paul.

Paul possessed excellent theological gifts, but knew little about Jesus. That is why he surrounded himself with John Mark, who later became a disciple of Peter and the writer of the first gospel. Following Paul was very difficult and John Mark, longing for his family in Jerusalem, abandoned Paul. When he returned, he had a very violent argument with Paul. The latter did not want to forgive Mark who with Barnabas, probably his uncle, had to leave Paul (Acts 15:39). Paul repented and wished to have Mark back with him again; but by then, Mark was already a disciple of Peter (2 Timothy 4:11).

One hundred percent committed to the cause of Christ, he claims for himself the title of Apostle for the lot that he did for the Gospel, in founding Christian communities among the Gentiles in the course of three great journeys that he made. Based on Jesus' philosophy, Paul understands that being an apostle is not a title with pedigree, exclusive to the twelve which is never lost, even if it is not exercised, something like having blue blood. Faithful to Jesus’ philosophy of "by their fruits you will know them", for Paul an apostle is someone who acts as such.

And no one acted more like an apostle than him for the lot that he did to spread the gospel over the course of the three journeys, for the Christian communities he founded in his travels north and south of the Mediterranean, and for the many letters that he wrote: half of the New Testament. Paul not only retained the title for himself, but also gave it to his collaborators.

Competent, self-disciplined and firm (1 Corinthians 9:24-27), he can even be affective and sentimental (Philippians 1: 7-8), it is impossible to remain indifferent to Paul: one either loves him or hates him. While a prisoner, he became the ship's captain. Judged by Tertullus, Felix and Agrippa, he took the reins of his own fate, and in prison, the guards were his prisoners.

Council of Jerusalem
Most people understand that the Council of Jerusalem, like all councils, was about a doctrinal issue between two factions of Christianity, the Judaizers and the Hellenists. But it was not quite like that.

Rivalry between Jesus’ relatives and disciples
After there had been much debate, Peter stood up and said to them, ‘My brothers, you know that in the early days God made a choice among you, that I should be the one through whom the Gentiles would hear the message of the good news and become believers. (…) The whole assembly kept silence, and listened to Barnabas and Paul as they told of all the signs and wonders that God had done through them among the Gentiles. After they finished speaking, James replied, ‘My brothers, listen to me. Simeon has relates how God first looked favourably on the Gentiles, to take from among them a people for him this agrees with the words of the prophets…  Acts 15:7, 12-15

At stake in this Council was also a less known issue, but one that is anticipated both in the Gospels and in the same text of the Acts about the Council: the rivalry between the blood relatives of Jesus and his disciples.

James, the Lord's brother and the leader of the Jerusalem community, was not only the leader of the Judaizers, but also considered himself Jesus’ successor because he was his most direct family member. We must not forget that Jesus is of David's lineage and that all kings after David were his descendants. Therefore, James understands that he and not Peter should be the leader of Jesus' movement.

In the text of the Council mentioned above, we see that Peter gives the inspiration to the Councilors, bearing in mind above all his experience of the baptism of the Roman centurion Cornelius; Paul and Barnabas present the question, but the one who decides and hits the hammer on the table is in fact James.

Mark, the first gospel to be written from the preaching of Peter the leader of the disciples, in fact conveys a bad image of Jesus' relatives, even saying that they considered Jesus mad; and when Jesus' relatives wanted to speak to him, Mark has Jesus saying that his relatives are not those of blood, but those who do God's will (Mark 3:31-35).

It apparently took time to resolve the question of rivalry between Jesus' relatives and his disciples, since the Gospel of John, the last to be written, returns to this issue, placing in Jesus’ own lips a form of reconciliation between Jesus' relatives and his disciples: When Jesus saw his mother and the disciple whom he loved standing beside her, he said to his mother, ‘Woman, here is your son.’ Then he said to the disciple, ‘Here is your mother.’ And from that hour the disciple took her into his own home. John 19:26-27

Rivalry between the Judaizers and the Hellenists
James:  Therefore I have reached the decision that we should not trouble those Gentiles who are turning to God, but we should write to them to abstain only from things polluted by idols and from fornication and from whatever has been strangled and from blood. Acts 15:19-20

"Against facts there are no arguments", says the people, but with regard to the facts about "Jesus of Nazareth", dissenting arguments surged from almost the very beginning. One thing is what happens, another is the different versions of what happens and the different interpretations of what happens.

It's not enough to see the facts, one needs to know how to interpret them. The disciples on the road to Emmaus saw the facts, but could not interpret them, they needed Jesus’ help. Now the nascent Church, in Jesus’ absence, had the aid of the Holy Spirit who helped her interpret the revelation that took place in Jesus of Nazareth.

When we speak of the first Church of Jerusalem, we tend to understand that it was a Church united in the same doctrine, but it was not so. Right from the beginning, there were two factions of Christianity in conflict with each other:  

The Judaizers – they were at the same time Christians and Jews who contradictorily reconciled the temple with the Eucharist, the law of Christ with the Law of Moses and who were a mixture of Christianity. Even today in Ethiopia there are Coptic Christians who place at the same level the Mosaic Law and Christ’s law and who do not eat pork, for example, prohibited by the Law of Moses.

The leader of this movement was neither Peter nor John who accompanied him many times, but James, the Lord's brother. Peter would have favored this movement at first, since in the book of Acts we see how he and John frequented the Temple. However, after his experience in Caesarea, he was more on the side of the Hellenists, especially since Paul became the leader of this movement. The Holy Spirit would have told Peter that there was little future with the Jews.

The Hellenists – they were the Jews from the Diaspora who had returned to Jerusalem; their first leaders were Stephen and Philip (Acts 6:5). The Hellenists, as their name indicates, did not speak Aramaic, but Greek; their culture was Greek. As we see in Stephen's speech before his death, they understood that Jesus had opposed the law of the Jews and the Temple, so it was a contradiction for them to be a Jew and be a Christian at the same time.

Familiar with the Greek culture, some of these Hellenists began to successfully preach to the Gentiles. The conversion of the Gentiles to Christianity was much greater than that of the Jews, so they understood that these new Christians who did not have Judaism as the basis of their culture should not submit to any of the prescriptions of the Law of Moses, especially that of circumcision.  

The Hellenists absolutize the figure of Jesus as being the new Moses, as being superior to the Sabbath, as being the new Temple, as the Gospel of Matthew, written for the Jews, well proves. And for them, Christ came to put an end to cultural, political, or racial divisions; they understand that Christianity has a universal vocation to unite peoples, so they fully subscribe to what St. Paul said:  

There is no longer Jew or Greek, there is no longer slave or free, there is no longer male and female; for all of you are one in Christ Jesus. Galatians 3:28

Between James, representing Judaism where Jesus’ movement was born, and Paul, representing the Hellenic world, Christianity would consolidate and grow. Peter is the Pontifex Maximus, not only uniting the two worlds at that time, but also allowing the new faith to move from Jerusalem to the rest of the world.

Fr. Jorge Amaro, IMC



April 1, 2021

3 Births the Church Celebrates: Mary - John the Baptist - Jesus

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Birth and death are one and the same thing. Death can be seen as a birth and birth as a death. Both the act of being born and the act of dying are transient passages, from one form of life to another form of life.

The Church celebrates the deaths of saints as births into eternity; in her veneration, the Church never celebrates their arrival into this world, but rather their departure into eternity. In addition to the birth of Jesus, however, the Church celebrates the birth of Mary, because she is his mother, and of John the Baptist, because he is his forerunner.

The first gospel to be written was Mark’s, and there are no references of Jesus' childhood in it: it begins with the work of the adult Jesus. After Mark’s Gospel, the Church wanted to know what happened before Jesus revealed himself to the people, and this meant talking about the two individuals who were very much part of Jesus' life: Mary, his mother, who conceived him, gave birth to him, and accompanied him throughout his life until his end on the cross, and John the Baptist who was his forerunner and initiator of his public life.

MARY
Our Protestant brothers and sisters do not care to know about Jesus' mother and they have the same aversion towards her as the Muslims have towards the mother of Mohammed and the Buddhists towards the mother of Buddha. They can ignore the mothers of Buddha and Mohammed and still be good Buddhists and Muslims, because their names do not appear in any of the writings of these religions.

The same cannot be said about the mother of Jesus: her name appears several times in the four gospels. Mary was not only the mother of Jesus, she was also a disciple of her son because, together with the other women, she never deserted him and, after the death of her son, she never abandoned the disciples of Christ. An authentic Christian, therefore, is not one who can completely ignore the mother of Christ; it is not possible to love the child and ignore his mother.

With the same rigors with which Luke (Luke 1:1-4 and Acts 1:1-4) wrote his gospel about the life of Jesus and the Acts of the Apostles about the early Church, we want to investigate what is known or is possible to know about Mary. It is certain that we do not have eyewitnesses to the facts that Luke had, we only have some documents that say very little about the mother of Jesus.

Mary in Saint Paul
The first writer of the New Testament, St. Paul, does not speak of Mary in any of his letters. We can allude to a number of reasons for this fact. Although many experts of St. Paul wish to exonerate the apostle of his patriarchal or macho mentality, there is just too much evidence that bears proof of this fact. Like the vast majority of men of his time, St. Paul reserves a secondary role to women.  
 

Another reason for Paul not to mention the name of Jesus' mother is that his letters are doctrinal, not historical, since St. Paul, unlike the other apostles, was neither an eyewitness nor had Luke’s historical concern. A good Pharisee that he was, his concern was solely doctrinal.

But when the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son born of a woman, born under the law, in order to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as children. Galatians 4:4-5 (year 40-50 AD)

In this single text where it is mentioned that Jesus did not come into the world like a meteorite or by any other physical miraculous means, but that he was born of a woman like all human beings, what is at stake, as in the whole perspective of the Galatians, is the opposition between the Law and grace. The name of the woman of whom Jesus was born is not mentioned since this is not the central theme of the letter or these verses.

Mary in Saint Mark
Then he (Jesus) went home; and the crowd came together again, so that they could not even eat. When his family heard it, they went out to restrain him, for people were saying, ‘He has gone out of his mind.’ Mark 3:20-21

The first very indirect and tangential mention by Mark of Mary, the mother of Jesus, takes place in this very controversial text. Because it literally says that Jesus' relatives thought he has gone crazy. From the other evangelists and by St. Mark himself, we know that Mary is always close to Jesus, attentive and concerned about her son, with what others say about him and acting like any other loving mother. Therefore, Mary seems to be included in the word family.

This does not seem likely to me for two reasons: in the gospels as a whole, we see that Mary is a woman who is very thoughtful about what she says and what she does, without any reactive behavior. She does not say nor do anything without deliberating in her heart and mind, and when she is confused and does not know what to say or do, she remains silent, guarding and pondering everything in her heart (Luke 2:16-21).

On the other hand, if "family" included the mother of Jesus, it would not make sense to say next, in another verse within the same chapter of Mark where she is most directly mentioned, "Mother and brothers of Jesus", that she and the brothers of the Lord had just arrived.

Jesus often takes advantage of a certain situation to present his doctrine. One of the examples of this is when Jesus' apostles forgot to buy bread. Since bread is fermented grain, Jesus took advantage of the cue to speak of the leaven of the Pharisees, (Matthew 16:5-12).

Clearly the apostles are led to think that Jesus is criticizing them indirectly for not having bought bread, but Jesus explicitly says that this cannot be the interpretation of what he said, since he who multiplied bread for thousands of people could have done the same for his disciples.

In the same way, Jesus is not disrespecting his mother, but only taking advantage of the situation to say that being his disciple is more important than being one of his relatives. In the case of his mother, she too was a disciple first, she heard the Word, put it into practice, and only then, and precisely because she put the Word into practice, she is a mother, that is, for having done God’s will. In Mary then, the discipleship precedes the motherhood. We too can become relatives of Jesus by following the path of Mary.

He left that place and came to his home town, and his disciples followed him. On the Sabbath he began to teach in the synagogue and many who heard him were astounded. They said, ‘Where did this man get all this? What is this wisdom that has been given to him? What deeds of power are being done by his hands! Is not this the carpenter, the son of Mary and brother of James and Joses and Judas and Simon, and are not his sisters here with us?’ And they took offence at him. Mark 6:1-3

Finally, later on, Mark tells us the name of Jesus' mother from the mouth of the people of his village, in a tactical question full of contempt and humiliation. At that time in Israel, when you wanted to insult someone, all you had to do was to name the person after their mother and not their father. The expression "son of Mary" is highly derogatory, even if Joseph was already deceased.  

Mark is a short gospel, with only 16 chapters and laconic about many other things; it also does not give us a good picture of the disciples' understanding of the Master. At least it does give us the name of the Lord's mother, Mary. If we want to know more about Mary, we have to turn to the other two synoptic gospels, which are more complete and focus more on Jesus' childhood and the circumstances of his birth.

The Immaculate Conception of Mary
"It is a sweet and pious belief that the infusion of Mary’s soul was affected without original sin; so that in the very infusion of her soul she was also purified from original sin and adorned with God’s gifts, receiving a pure soul infused by God; thus from the moment she began to live she was free from all sin.”  (Martin Luther, Sermon: On the Day of the Immaculate Conception of the Mother of God, 1527)

The great Protestant reformers -- Luther, Calvin and Zwingli -- accept all Marian dogmas. The indifference, contempt and almost hatred of Mary that certain Protestants show today do not come from the reformers, but from the fanatics after them.

The immaculate conception of the Virgin Mary, the solemnity which the Church celebrates on December 8th, already close to the Lord's Christmas, is another way to start over again. It is the substitution of the flood that destroyed the old, the sin, to begin again. In Mary, God gave up the destruction of the world. That is why Mary is a "non-destructive flood" because, little by little, with the Kingdom of her son, she will flood the world with the divine Grace that kills sin. Mary is therefore the new ark of Noah that saves humanity from sin, because she contains this Savior who is Christ her son.

Long ago God spoke to our ancestors in many and various ways by the prophets, but in these last days he has spoken to us by a SonHebrews 1:1-2

But when the fullness of time had come, God sent his Son, born of a woman... Galatians 4:4

Mary is not the beginning of the story of Salvation: this began with Abraham and is continued from generation to generation by prophets, judges, kings, and other leaders of the chosen people. Mary is the culmination of this story, as the author of the letter to the Hebrews mentions above, in these last days, or as St. Paul says, in the fullness of time.

The story of Salvation is about people who hand over, from generation to generation, the seed of Goodness in the midst of a world that lives the story of Evil. However, this seed of goodness coexists within the same person with the evilness. Those who were bearers of the seed of goodness or of the testimony of goodness in this relay race were not perfect people as we well know from the Bible, where their flaws and sins are well documented, from Abraham, Moses, David to so many others who were, as St. Augustine would later say in defining man, "simul justus et peccator", at the same time righteous and sinful.

Mary is the last link in this chain of goodness, God put in Mary the final touches to eliminate all traces of evil in preparation for the Incarnation of His son. It is logical that if God were to take on human nature to speak to men, that he would not assume a human nature fallen into sin, he would not assume a human nature decadent of our parents' sin, but rather the human nature that He had created in the beginning. That is, he was going to take on the nature of Adam and Eve before the fall. That is why it is said that Mary is the new Eve and Christ the new Adam.

At the moment when the genetic material of Joaquim's half-cell united with the genetic material of Anna's half-cell to form a new genetic code, the DNA of Mary, God intervened in genetic engineering and replaced the genes spoiled or corrupted by the sin that has been transmitted from generation to generation since Adam and Eve, by the genes that Adam and Eve themselves possessed before they ruined human nature by sinning. In other words, He replaced the damaged pieces with the repaired and original pieces.

When the Angel Gabriel visits Mary, he recognizes in her the new Eve (Eva) by pronouncing this very name backwards as a greeting (Ave/Hail). Mary is the masterpiece of God's genetic engineering; Mary is God's recreation in virtue of his direct and intentional intervention in the history of mankind. Because Mary, in communion with the same God, will generate, produce the vaccine, that is Christ her son, against sin. Mary is not only the beginning of Salvation of the world, for in her Immaculate Conception as a preparation for Jesus coming, she is also the first to be saved.

Just as Moses lifted up the serpent in the wilderness, so must the Son of Man be lifted up that whoever believes in him may have eternal life. John 3:14-15

The son of Mary is the one who is going to replace the serpent erected in the desert by Moses, the Saviour of the Jewish people, to heal everyone from the bite of the ancient serpent who poisoned Eve, Adam, and their descendants from one generation to the next.

Nativity of Mary
We cannot acknowledge the blessings brought us by Jesus without acknowledging at the same time how highly God honored and enriched Mary in choosing her to be the Mother of God.”
(John Calvin," Comm. Sur l'Harm. Evang.", 20)

Nine months after the Immaculate Conception of the Virgin Mary, the Church celebrates the nativity of Our Lady on September 8th. From Isaac, Samuel, Samson, etc., in a biblical context of so many births under the same circumstances, according to tradition, Mary was also born to parents of advanced age and barren, named Joachim and Anna. In response to their perseverance and constancy in prayer, these parents were graced by God with the gift of a baby girl.

There are some who put them residing in Nazareth, but the most reliable tradition places them in Jerusalem, next to the pool of Bethesda where the pilgrims purified themselves before entering the temple. Today stands the Basilica of St. Anne, located very close to one of the main entrances of the Temple and the present Lion’s Gate in the wall of the Old City, in the Muslim Quarter.

The girl received the name Miriam which means seer, sovereign lady. It was most likely an Egyptian name because, as we know, Miriam was the name of Moses' sister. There are those who think that it derives from the Sanskrit name Marya which literally means purity, virtue, virginity; the Latin translation is Maria. Like Samuel, she was also offered to the Temple of Jerusalem at the age of three, and remained there until she was twelve years old, when she was given in marriage to Joseph.

As we know, the canonical evangelicals tell us nothing about the birth of Mary. The basis of tradition, however, is quite ancient since it comes from an apocryphal writing of the second century, the Protoevangelium of James, written around the year 150.

Mary's virginity at the service of her motherhood
I greatly esteem the Mother of God, the Virgin Mary perpetually chaste and immaculate. I firmly believe that Mary, according to the words of the gospel as a pure Virgin brought forth for us the Son of God and in childbirth and after childbirth forever remained a pure, intact Virgin. (Corpus Reformatorum: Zwingli - principal leader of the Protestant Reformation in Switzerland - Opera 2, 189)

Christ was the only Son of Mary, and the Virgin Mary bore no children besides Him... I am inclined to agree with those who declare that 'brothers' really mean 'cousins' here, for the Sacred Scripture and the Jews have always called cousins brothers.  (Martin Luther, Sermon, 1539)

Mary is the Mother of Jesus and the Mother of all of us, even though it was Christ alone who reposed on her knees... If he is ours, we ought to be in his situation: there where he is, we ought also to be and everything he has ought to be ours. So his mother is also our mother... (Martin Luther, Christmas Sermon of 1529)

Once again we see that the Protestant reformers venerated Mary then as much as the Catholics and the Orthodox, and even the Muslims, venerate her today. The problem arises, both for  the Protestants and the Catholics, in the excessive emphasis placed on Mary's virginity, as if in her or in anyone else, virginity has a value in itself, both spiritually and physically.

I express myself in total disagreement with the exclusively feminine use of the name "Virgin", as the Church does in the celebration of the Saints Cecilia, Agnes, Felicity, Perpetual, Agatha, who are saints exclusively because they are virgins. The Church does not use the title Virgin for male saints such as Francisco of Fatima, Anthony of Lisbon, Domenico Savio and Luigi Gonzaga who were certainly also virgins.

If it is a human value, virginity cannot be an exclusively feminine value. There are no feminine values and masculine values, there are only human values. When too much emphasis is placed on female virginity, the importance of the hymen that women have and that men do not possess is exacerbated. The hymen is formed as a prophylactic means to close a woman's womb and protect her against infections. Throughout the history of mankind, in all cultures, some more so than others, it has been used by men as an instrument of vexation, domination, humiliation and shame against women.

The virginity of Our Lady, described as virgin before, during and after childbirth, certainly alludes to this instrument of domination of a patriarchal and chauvinistic history. Especially in the case of virginity during childbirth, it cannot refer to the hymen as if it were possible for a woman to give birth without tearing it.

If virginity is a value, it should be extended to the whole human race and not only to women, so it cannot be associated with the physical, but the spiritual. A married woman or man can be a virgin if they are pure and totally faithful to each other. On the other hand, if virginity is a spiritual human value, a woman or man can be a virgin even after they have lost their physical virginity.

In other words, if virginity is a value, it is always within the reach of a human being and is not something that can be lost. In fact, if it is a value, it is not acquired at birth, but conquered at hand with effort and dedication. The only thing that can be lost forever, in an irrecoverable way, is innocence or naivety, not virginity.

It is said that a person presented himself before God after his death and said: Look, Sir, my hands are clean and pure. I see, said the Lord, but they are empty... before they were dirty, but full of good works...

Virginity, both in the case of Mary as in another person, exists in function of motherhood. Virginity in itself is not a human value, but rather a preparation for a natural physical motherhood or for a spiritual motherhood such as that of Mother Teresa of Calcutta. The same applies to men. A virginity that exists for itself and not at the service of a fruitful motherhood is spiritual barrenness, not virginity in the Christian spiritual sense.

I fear that the exaggerated exaltation of virginity is directly proportional to the negative view of sex. That is, those who most exalt the value of virginity, tend to view sex with more suspicion, developing a puritanical spirituality that looks at sex as ugly and dirty. Whoever does so, forgets that the sin of Adam and Eve was not sexual, that sex was created by God as a means of putting into practice his commandment to "be fruitful and multiply", (Genesis 9:7).

Conclusion
As a devotee of Mary whom I have as my heavenly Mother, I affirm that she was conceived without sin by virtue of God's special favor to her and to humanity; she conceived by the work of the Holy Spirit, was the mother of only one child born to her, but spiritual mother of all humanity and who, by virtue of this motherhood, remained a virgin because she was the lover of only one God, of only one husband, of the nascent Church and of all humanity.

JOHN THE BAPTIST
Jesus of Nazareth, disciple of John the Baptist
‘What did you go out into the wilderness to look at? A reed shaken by the wind? What then did you go out to see? Someone dressed in soft robes? Look, those who put on fine clothing and live in luxury are in royal palaces. What then did you go out to see? A prophet? Yes, I tell you, and more than a prophet. (…) I tell you, among those born of women no one is greater than John; yet the least in the kingdom of God is greater than he.’  Luke 7:24-26, 28

John the Baptist, the Lord's cousin according to tradition, is a figure intentionally ignored by the Church and by the evangelists themselves who do everything to take away his importance even though, being honest with themselves, they have to speak about him. The Church presents him as the precursor, especially in the season of Advent, as the one who prepares the way of the Lord, although little is said about how the way was prepared.

Was he only a precursor, or was he something more than that? He was the initiator of a movement that Jesus of Nazareth continued. In fact, some of Jesus' disciples were once John’s disciples. Today almost all biblicists agree that Jesus was a disciple of John the Baptist and while the evangelists, each in their own way, try to hide this fact, Jesus is not ashamed to say it as it is implied in the text mentioned above. About John, his Master (Teacher), Jesus has only positive words of veneration and esteem. However, as I put in bold, the evangelists add a phrase that not only neutralizes but almost nullifies what Jesus said when they mention that the least in the Kingdom of God is greater than he (John).

At the beginning of Jesus’ public life, the people and Herod Antipas mistaken him, the disciple, with John the Master, which is perfectly normal. Every good disciple imitates the master until he leaves and becomes independent of him, later stating their differences or their nuances. Jesus seems to accept that they compare him to John, for it is a sign that he is a good disciple of his (Luke 9:7-9; Matthew 16:13-20).

In his lectures and book on Jesus, theologian Denis McBride looks at this subject in a brilliant way. John the Baptist is the name most cited in the gospels, more than that of any apostle, including Peter’s. When Peter raised his voice and set out the criteria for electing Judas' replacement, he said that it had to be someone who had been with them from the Baptism of John to the Resurrection of Jesus (Acts 1:21-22).

That message spread throughout Judea, beginning in Galilee after the baptism that John announced… (Acts 10:37) – The same Peter, in giving a summary of Jesus' ministry, begins by saying that it began where the ministry of John the Baptist ended. All four evangelists begin the story of Jesus where the story of John ends.

Mark opens his gospel with the ministry of John; John the Evangelist, by contrast, mentions him in the prologue as a witness to the Light who is Christ, and repeats this several times to make it clear that even though John precedes Jesus chronologically, Jesus as the Son of God existed before John. Luke and Matthew, when dealing with Jesus' childhood, are obliged to deal with John the Baptist's childhood as well.

It is therefore clear that John's ministry has to do with the hidden life of Jesus before his public life. It began before Jesus’ ministry, and even if Jesus takes John’s place after his death, as every disciple does in replacing the master, John's ministry does not end.

McBride says that there are still followers of John the Baptist in Iraq today, who believe that John was the Messiah and that Jesus was his first disciple. The argument they present as proof is that Jesus leaves his land to join John, to follow John and not the other way around. Jesus follows John and submits to his baptism, John does not follow Jesus.

Many who heard him were astounded. They said, ‘Where did this man get all this? What is this wisdom that has been given to him?  (Mark 6:2) – This suggests that Jesus did not remain in Nazareth throughout his hidden life. The text suggests that, at some point in his life, Jesus left his trade as a carpenter, his mother, his land, to join the Baptist movement and it was as John’s disciple that he acquired all the wisdom that amazed his countrymen. The text also suggests that Jesus was away for a long time, not just spending a weekend with the Baptist, but staying in his company for several years.  

The baptism of Jesus
In those days Jesus came from Nazareth of Galilee and was baptized by John in the Jordan. And just as he was coming up out of the water, he saw the heavens torn apart and the Spirit descending like a dove on him. And a voice came from heaven, ‘You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.  Mark 1:9-11

Then Jesus came from Galilee to John at the Jordan, to be baptized by him. John would have prevented him, saying, ‘I need to be baptized by you, and do you come to me?’ But Jesus answered him, ‘Let it be so now; for it is proper for us in this way to fulfil all righteousness.’ The he consented. And when Jesus had been baptized, just as he came up from the water, suddenly the heavens were opened to him and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove and alighting on him. And a voice from heaven said, ‘This is my Son, the Beloved, with whom I am well pleased. Matthew 3:13-17

And when all the people were baptized and when Jesus also had been baptized and was praying, the heaven was opened, and the Holy Spirit descended upon him in bodily form like a dove. And a voice came from heaven, ‘You are my Son, the Beloved; with you I am well pleased.’  Luke 3:21-22

I myself did not know him, but the one who sent me to baptize with water said to me, “He on whom you see the Spirit descend and remain is the one who baptizes with the Holy Spirit.” And I myself have seen and have testified that this is the Son of God.  John 1:33-34

The episode of the baptism of the disciple Jesus by the master John was for the evangelists an embarrassing scandal. It is true that the reputation of the great John the Baptist left the evangelists perplexed and nervous because they wanted to prove to their readers in a blunt way, without escaping the reality of the facts, that Jesus was greater than John because it was he and not John who is the messiah, the long-awaited one of the nations.

Mark, the first to recognize him, admits that Jesus submitted to John's baptism without question. However, without describing the act of the baptism itself, he diverts our attention to the voice from above.
Matthew does not seem to accept this fact and places there an explanatory and justifiable dialogue between Jesus and John where it is seen that authority resides in Jesus.
Luke ignores the episode, referring to it after it happened, also diverting our attention to the voice from above.
John does not address the baptism of Jesus, he eliminates it completely, since even John the Baptist himself is not called the Baptist in this gospel, but only as John, a witness of Christ.

The disciples of John reported all these things to him. So John summoned two of his disciples and sent them to the Lord to ask, ‘Are you the one who is to come, or are we to wait for another?’  Luke 7:18-19

The four gospels are unanimous in saying that John did not know the true identity of his disciple Jesus and died in prison without ever arriving at this knowledge. How is it possible that the baptism of Jesus took place as described in the gospels and later with John the Baptist in prison not knowing who is the one whom he himself baptized?

Apparently, we have an incongruity here; however, we must take into account that between the historical facts of Jesus and John, and their description in the written gospels, about 50 years of apostolic preaching had passed. In other words, it is very likely that the episode of the voice from above is the work of the evangelists to try to explain theologically the fact that Jesus submitted to the baptism of John and was part of his movement as a disciple.

We have seen how John the Evangelist removes the title of the Baptist from John, giving him the name of witness of Jesus instead. However, he is the only evangelist who places the two to develop their ministry at the same time, or better said, Jesus as a disciple working in the movement of the Baptist Master; John baptizing in Samaria, a territory not yet evangelized, and Jesus in Judea where John had already evangelized.  

JESUS
The carpenter, the son of Mary, was born according to tradition in Bethlehem, during a journey that his parents Mary and Joseph had undertaken to register in the land of origin of their ancestors. It is not of this birth that we discuss here, but of the long years of preparation or "gestation" to be born or revealed to the world. If the gestation of the physical body of Jesus is the work of God and Mary, the gestation of his human formation is the work of his Master, John the Baptist.

As we have seen, Jesus has relatively many originalities compared to John. But he also has much in common with the master. Both Jesus and John, his master and forerunner, were charismatic laymen in line with the prophets of Israel who emerge in a time for a time, that is, they arise as the divine solution to a concrete human problem in a concrete time and situation. In line with the prophecy of Israel, the prophet is not an instituted or elected authority, but a charismatic moral authority that arises spontaneously or by divine will.

In this sense, and contrary to instituted authority, a prophet not only utters the voice of God, but he also incarnates the message with his life in dramatic gestures, like Isaiah who walked around naked among the people to show them what was about to happen to those who were going to be exiled. Similarly, the prophet Hosea married a prostitute so that his life would be an audiovisual of the people's infidelity to God.

In line with the prophets before them, Jesus and John are against the established authority, they do not submit to it, but criticize it for its lack of moral authority. And when these instituted authority present their credentials, revealing their roots, John says that the axe is already placed at the root of the trees; both John and Jesus show next that they are not interested in the roots, but in the fruits, for it is by the fruits, that is, by the works that one knows someone. And when these people say that they are so and so, that they are children of Abraham, both John and Jesus call them a brood of vipers, and say that God has the power to raise up children to Abraham from these stones, (Matthew 3:7-12).

In line with the previous prophets, Jesus and John are against the Temple and its priests, and they too repeat the refrain that runs through all the prophecies of Israel: I want mercy, not sacrifice, (Hosea 6:6; Matthew 9:13).

Similarities and differences between Jesus and John
According to Denis McBride there are many similarities between the master John the Baptist, the initiator of the movement, and Jesus, his disciple. Both are prophets, they do not marry, they are not priests or doctors of the law, and they do not belong to any religious group as both are independent prophets who confront the religious status quo. They are religious authorities persecuted by civil authorities determined to erase their word and stop their action.

They believe that the story of Israel is about to end and that another kingdom is going to replace Israel. Both carry out their ministry far from sacred places. Both are open to every kind of people, even to those whom they criticize, they show preference to the poor and marginalized of society, for the publicans, shepherds, prostitutes...

Jesus is distinguished from John, by the image he has of God, as a loving and merciful Father. He brings salvation to the villages and towns where the people lives, he is not fixed in one place. He heals, exorcises, things that John never did. Unlike the ascetic John who lived isolated in the desert, Jesus lives with the people, eats and drinks and celebrates with the people; like the people in all things, except sin.

The power to forgive sins
(...) that you may know that the Son of Man has authority on earth to forgive sins – he then said to the paralytic – ‘Stand up, take your bed and go to your home.’ And he stood up and went to his home. When the crowds saw it, they were filled with awe, and they glorified God, who had given such authority to human beings. Matthew 9:6-8

The power and the faculty to forgive sins in all religious traditions is reserved to priests. In Israel, as we know, there was only one place where sins can be forgiven: the Temple of Jerusalem. The forgiveness of sins had become, in the time of Jesus and John, a profitable business for the priestly caste.

Annas and Caiaphas owned large flocks and to make it easy to sell away their countless goats, they would declare defective and reject the goats and lambs that the people brought to the temple from their own flocks so that the people were left with no choice but to buy from them in order to have animals to offer to God as atonement for their sins.

Every day there were sacrifices in the temple, at least once in the morning and once in the afternoon. But on the feast days there were many more, especially at Passover. It is estimated that at the time Jesus died on the cross, more than 3,000 goats and lambs were sacrificed at the altar of the Temple.

Now John wore clothing of camel’s hair with a leather belt around his waist, and his food was locusts and wild honey. Then the people of Jerusalem and all Judea were going out to him and all the region along the Jordan, and they were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins. Matthew 3:4-6

From one moment to the next, a layman appears who makes a bypass of the Temple of Jerusalem with a water ceremony that invoked bodily and spiritual cleanliness, purity so dear to the Jews, and who forgave sins without demanding money in return - with this the whole priestly caste felt threatened.

It would really have been John the Baptist who began this movement or, as the proverb suggests, "Libri ex libris fiunt", books come from books. Jesus was inspired by John the Baptist to start something that went way beyond John. Wouldn’t this same thing have happened to John, that is, wouldn’t he too have been inspired by something that already existed to bring this original and revolutionary forgiveness of sin, not only to Israel but to all religions as a whole, since all of them required sacrifice to appease the divine wrath?

It is certain that the question of whether the Baptist's movement was purely human or divinely inspired was raised. Jesus uses this doubt to defend himself before the Pharisees' insistent question about his authority to say what he was saying and do what he was doing. "Answer me, and I will tell you by what authority I do these things. Did the baptism of John come from heaven, or was it of human origin?" (Mark 11:30). Jesus well knew that they thought it was from men, since only they themselves could forgive sins, but as there were many people there waiting for their answer, they responded to Jesus with a silence.

Qumran
If in the desert on the banks of the Dead Sea, right next door to where John and Jesus were baptizing, there was not a community of monks, the Essenes, who shared the same rites and the same ideas as the two prophets, occupying the same geographical space at the same historical time, we would be inclined to think that the ritual of forgiveness of sins was an original creation of John. But since this community exists two steps from the Jordan River, we are led to think that it had inspired John and Jesus.

So many monks of Qumran like John were critical of Jerusalem's sacrificial system. Both were apocalyptic and thought Israel was coming to the end of its days. Both emphasized the need to purify themselves with water; the Essenes in fact purified themselves several times a day.

The difference between these monks and John the Baptist is that the monks were elitists and segregationists, keeping salvation to themselves, while John probably abandoned this community to offer salvation to everyone. Jesus abandoned the Jordan to bring salvation to all of Israel, going from village to village, from house to house, and commanded his disciples to take the salvation to the entire world.

Here is the Lamb of God - John 1:29
This is the statement of John the Baptist that puts an end to the dispute between forgiveness through sacrifice and free forgiveness through baptism. Jesus declares that the sacrifice of others has no salvific power, what has saving power is the sacrifice itself.

The sacrifices of the Old Law of offering something external to oneself ended with Jesus and the sacrifices of the New Law of offering oneself began. On the cross, Jesus offers himself in an absolutely perfect sacrificial act. A non plus ultra or once and for all – because he is the priest, the temple, the altar and the lamb. The act of Jesus is perfect, unparalleled and unrepeatable because one cannot die twice.

Do this in remembrance of me (Luke 22:19) – The Church, from generation to generation, repeats, acts and updates the only sacrifice that takes away the sin of the world. Whether or not the people of Israel accepts this sacrifice for its redemption, the fact is that after the death of Jesus, the Temple, providentially or by irony of fate, was destroyed and to this day has not been rebuilt.

Conclusion
Mary gives birth to Jesus of Nazareth; John the Baptist prepares the way for the Mission in which Jesus discovers himself as the Son of God and the Saviour of Humanity.

Fr. Jorge Amaro, IMC