"You are Peter"

Through history many have rebelled against the contents and teachings of faith. Not few of them do so sinking into the dynamic of temptation. What is that? It is easy to find the answer: It is the presentation of an apparent good as the goal. It can be seen at work with the snake and Eve, where she fails. It can also be seen in the Demon's action and our Lord. In these second example He succeeds putting in evidence the root of evil. Today, once more, we can see the Ministry of Peter questioned, showing the "mystery of iniquity" in action. Ideologies and rationalism are a clumsy excuse and they can really hide nothing. Whoever keeps the living memory of the Church and is aware of what is going on in the world these days, can see the events as they really are.

That has is showed by a recent and illuminating document of the Vatican Congregation that Cardinal Joseph Ratzinger presides: "Considerations of the Congregation for the Doctrine of Faith (CDF) in connection with the records of the symposium on the 'The Primacy of the Successor of Peter in the Mystery of the Church'."

"The Catholic Church is aware of having preserved, with fidelity to the Apostolic Tradition and the faith of the Fathers the ministry of Peter's Successor", the Pope has pointed out. "In the history of the Church, there is a continuity of doctrinal development on the primacy", highlights the document of the CDF. The ecclesiastic community has received, conserved and transmitted the "what Christ said about Peter and his role in the group of the Twelve. Thus, in the early Christian communities, as later throughout the Church, the image of Peter remained fixed as that of the Apostle who, despite his human weakness, was expressly assigned by Christ to the first place among the Twelve and was called to exercise a distinctive, specific task in the Church. He is the rock on which Christ will build his Church; he is the one, after he has been converted, whose faith will not fail and who will strengthen his brethren; lastly, he is the Shepherd who will lead the whole community of the Lord's disciples".

The believer well enlightened in his faith knows well that this is the way it has been, it is and it will be. The Pope is the rock on which our Lord Jesus establishes the Church and with the force of the Holy Spirit develops it in history, completing the task of prolonging it's mission as Mystic Body of Christ. Saint Peter is the founder of the Christian community of Rome and his first Bishop. The Popes are Peter's successors. The CDF considers helpful to remember this great reality in face of the forgetfulness or confusion of some: "In Peter's person, mission and ministry, in his presence and death in Rome - attested by the most ancient literary and archaeological tradition - the Church sees a deeper reality essentially related to her own mystery of communion and salvation: 'Ubi Petrus, ibi ergo Ecclesia'". The People of God always, and with intensifying more clarity, understands that the service to the unit in the faith that was entrusted to Peter and his successors, the Popes, belongs to the perennial structure of the universal Church born of Our Lord's side. It also knows very well that the gift of the succession in the Petrine Ministry and of his universal primate is linked to the place of his martyrdom: Rome. The Pope, Bishop of Rome, is today like yesterday Peter. We should remember the origin of the this truth: "You are Peter."

As well as Saint Peter was part of the Apostolic College presiding effectively over it, the Pope, Bishop of Rome, successor of the Rock, successor of Peter, belongs to the Body of the Bishops and presides over it. The Shepherds, in communion with the Roman Pontiff and under him, as successor of Peter, have under their responsibility to keep the faith and to proclaim the Gospel to all creatures. Primate and collegiality are not opposed, they are complementary. Bishops and the other faithful are not opposed, they are complementary in God's design of his Church. This way, the essential mission of preserving the faith and of evangelizing invites and reaches the rest of the Church, it reaches the other faithful, whom with their prayers and cooperation to the motions of the Holy Spirit, each one according to his own condition, are called to carry out the mission that the Church received from God.

The Pope by divine institution is successor of Saint Peter as servant of the universal Church, as Primate responsible for the care of the whole People of God. This way, the Pontiff has, because of the mission he received, total, supreme and universal authority on the whole Church. This Petrine Ministry is not only external, but rather it is inscribed in the heart of each portion of the Church. From there it opens up to the ministry of unity. The title with which the Pope is known: "Servant of the servants of God" is a beautifully proclamation of the gift made by the Most High to his Church in the Petrine Ministry.