Okay, famous passage, St. Peter receiving the keys to the Kingdom of Heaven, the foundation of the Church. But let’s give a little context with our first reading – Isaiah, some history behind why Christ chose to give Peter keys and not some other item or object or whatever.

Ancient Israel was of course a city that was really in the middle of the nation of Israel, more or less. It was inland. Israel, as you all kind of picture a map in your mind, Israel was on the Mediterranean coast, on the east coast of the Mediterranean Sea. And the Sea of Galilee, of course, was a fresh body of water, more or less. And then you had the Dead Sea just south of it, and the Jordan River connecting the two bodies of water. But then Jerusalem is right in the middle of the land, which is kind of unusual for a city to be built inland, especially an ancient city. You go to most cities, they’re built on rivers or on the coast. It’s just easy for commerce that way. Go to London or Paris or Chicago, wherever it might be, New York.

So why inland? Why this random spot? And it’s like kind of on a plateau in the desert also, hard to get to, not a lot of resources. Well, because this was the spot where Mount Moriah was, and that’s where Abraham was called to sacrifice Isaac. So it’s kind of a symbolic location. Abraham of course is the father of the nation of Israel. Now there is a spring of water, however, that does feed this mountain plateau, which is how they’re able to build walls and kind of sustain themselves throughout the various sieges that Israel faces.

But the steward of the Kingdom of Israel, so not the king of Israel, but the steward, kind of like his right-hand man, had a difficult task, but an important one, of ensuring that Israel could be a functioning city, that it could get food and water and that the walls were kept up and no foreign invaders could come in.

So the steward in the time of Isaiah the Prophet was a guy named Shebnub. And the steward of Israel was given kind of a lapel pen, if you will, keys that were put on his cloak. These are the keys of the steward of Israel, sort of like the Chancellor of England was given that sort of that sash, – that metallic sash around his chest – in the time of like St. Thomas More, Henry VIII and whatnot.

Anyway, Shebnub, who’s the steward of Israel, instead of taking care of the city of Jerusalem and diverting funds to keep up the wall, he builds a giant monument to himself on this other hillside outside of the city of Jerusalem. So he wastes their money. And so Isaiah is going to Shebnub saying, “Shebnub, you’re going to lose your job. The keys are going to be taken away from you, given to Heil Kye, given to another steward who’s going to properly take care of the city of the kingdom.”

Now, that guy, Shebnub’s successor did okay, but the stewards weren’t really great. And so basically what Jesus is saying, okay, last, I’m going to take the keys away finally, and I’m giving them at last to a rightful steward to St. Peter. And the keys are never going to be taken away from him. Or Peter is going to have the keys, and in a way he’s going to be given copies of the keys, and he’s going to give them to his successors, the Roman Pontiffs, the Popes.

So the Church is entrusted with the new city of Jerusalem, taking care of the Kingdom of Heaven, taking care of us. So yes, we can be properly fed and watered spiritually, that we can know Jesus Christ, and that we can work together as a community so that no one is left behind, no one is suffering. So the Church is here for us, and we need the Church, not just as this, you know, institution that keeps the rules, like the major league baseball rules commissioner, or whatever. The Church is a living body, Christ’s body, meant to keep us in this city. And when we’re in this city together, we’re flourishing. We’re receiving the word of God, helping one another, and ultimately, the path to heaven is being prepared for us.

So we pray for our Holy Father this day. We pray for all members of our Church, and especially for peace and unity in our Church and in our world. Amen.