Peter must have felt terribly guilty about denying Jesus three times. When the risen Jesus appears to Peter, Jesus offers him three opportunities to reaffirm his love and be reconciled (John 21:15-19).
The Catholic Church also believes that this passage establishes Peter as the leader of the early church and as the first pope., indicated by Jesus’ commands to Peter “feed my lambs,” “tend my sheep,” and “feed my sheep.” By linking Peter’s reconciliation to Peter’s authority, John seems to be reminding the Church to be humble and forgiving.
The Church’s standards are high. Catholicism isn’t out to just create good people, those who are morally mediocre. It aims to accomplish Jesus’ own goal: for us to “be perfect, just as your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48). Coupled with these extreme moral demands is the Church’s equally extreme mercy. The Church is not a force out to condemn the world. It’s a beacon of mercy, offering pardon and peace even to the worst failures among us. As G. K. Chesterton put it, “We men and women are all in the same boat, upon a stormy sea.” Catholics have a word for this seasickness: sin. It’s a spiritual disease and we’re all infected.
Jesus never suggested that people could accept His forgiveness through private prayers. Instead, He turned to His disciples, giving them authority to forgive sins in His name. Obviously this would require people verbalizing their sins to the apostles or their emissaries. God gave His priests the remarkable authority to forgive sins in His name, offering penitents an objective way to know His forgiveness.
On the first Easter Sunday evening, Jesus appeared to His Apostles, “breathed on them,” and said, “Receive the Holy Spirit. If you forgive men’s sins, they are forgiven them; if you hold them bound, they are held bound.” (John 20:21-23) Only twice in Sacred Scripture do we find God breathing into human beings. First, in the Genesis account of creation, God breathes the life of a soul into the man He has created. (Genesis 2:7) Now, Jesus, the Son, breathes His life into His Apostles His priests, so that through them He will “breathe” life into the souls of contrite sinners. In this scene, Christ instituted the sacrament of penance and made His Apostles the ministers of it.
At the ascension, Jesus again charged His Apostles with this ministry: “Thus it is written that the Messiah must suffer and rise from the dead on the third day. In His name penance for the remission of sins is to be preached to all the nations, beginning at Jerusalem. You are witnesses of this (Luke 24:46-48). Clearly, Jesus came to forgive sins, He wanted that reconciliation to continue and He gave the Church a sacrament through which priests would continue to act as the ministers of this reconciliation.
“Those who approach the sacrament of Penance obtain pardon from God’s mercy for the offense committed against him, and are, at the same time, reconciled with the Church which they have wounded by their sins and which by charity, by example, and by prayer labors for their conversion.” (Catechism of the Catholic Church #1422)
Our mission is clear: To “be perfect, just as your heavenly Father is perfect” (Matthew 5:48) and seek forgiveness when we fail, through His priests, so we can be reconciled to God.
By seeking true reconciliation through the sacrament, we restore the peace of the risen Christ. But confessing our sins is only one step in the reconciliation process. We must also be truly sorry and attempt to repair the damage our sin has done. Being far from perfect, here are some helpful downloads to refresh, examine, and to pray for your next God-given reconciliation.