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Last Sunday (June 29th) we celebrated the memory of Sts. Peter & Paul, and Pope Benedict took the occasion in Rome to open a whole year especially dedicated to St. Paul and his invaluable contribution to our knowledge of Christ because, by the best estimate of scholars, Saint Paul was born in the year 8 AD, and that means this year is the 2000th anniversary of his birth. Last week I made something of a comparison between the two chief apostles, but today I want to say something more about St. Paul so that, now and then through this year dedicated to him, I might share even more about him with you.
To begin with, when we hear the word Gospel we almost instinctively think of the four written Gospels we have at the beginning of the New Testament, credited to Matthew, Mark, Luke and John. Some people are surprise to hear St. Paul speak of “my Gospel” in the second chapter of his letter to the Romans. Paul’s Gospel? Aren’t there only four, the four in our Bible? Well, a Gospel is a proclamation of good news and the term Gospel, taken by itself, does not necessarily imply a written text. And even then, the earliest parts of the New Testament were written before the written Gospels were produced. The first parts of the New Testament that we have in our Bibles are some of Paul’s letters. His first letter that we have in our Bible was written around the year 55, perhaps fifteen years before the first written Gospel appeared. So there is, indeed, Paul’s proclamation of the Good news, but his Gospel is found in his various letters and not in an edited and structured text like the other four.
Even a casual comparison shows us that, while the essentials are the same in all four written texts, the tone and texture of each is different one from the other. One should expect, then, that Paul’s understanding of the good news of Jesus would also have a different flavor, a different emphasis. But there is another problem: the letters of Paul in our Bible are not arranged in chronological sequence. Like the Koran, the letters of Paul are arranged from longest to shortest, not from earliest to latest. The letter to the Romans, which is placed first, was written shortly before he went to Rome and probably to his death there, so it was certainly not his first. Because the letters are not in chronological order, reading them straight through creates a muddled sense of what Paul came to believe as he matured in the Gospel.
And that’s not all. While the four written Gospels came from authors who had the luxury of research (as Luke openly admits) and revision, Paul was a working pastor. His letters—except perhaps for the letter to the Romans—were written to his congregations usually in response to a problem. Take, as an example, what we just heard from his letter to the Corinthian church (1:12): “what’s this I hear: you’re squabbling among yourselves. Some of you say ‘I’m for Paul!’ ‘I’m for Apollos!’ ‘I’m for Cephas!’ ‘I’m for Christ!’ Has Christ been cut into pieces for you?” We are so accustomed to having Paul wag his finger at us that we may not see any further to the lyrical Good News he also brings. We need to put his upset aside if we want to see the heart-warming things he offers.
So I hope, as the year rolls on, we will be able to consider his message a little more deeply from time to time, and that we might come to realize all we do owe him for his ministry and praise him for his indomitable fidelity to Jesus Christ.