Sunday, June 29 from St. Augustine Cathedral

My dear brothers and sisters in the Lord,

For more than ten years, we have been asked to reflect upon the need to become a synodal Church. We’ve heard the word “synodality” first from Pope Francis—God rest his soul—and now his successor, our current Holy Father, Leo.

My guess is that many believers are not quite certain as to what the word means. What is it that we are being asked to live? And so today, on this feast of the princes of the Church, Saints Peter and Paul, perhaps we can get some clarity and find a path on how to do what Peter’s successor is asking of us.

For the very life of synodality did not begin ten years ago; it began at the very start of the Church. Let us begin by recalling these two extraordinary men. They were as different as oil and vinegar.

Peter was a fisherman—rough around the edges, impetuous, strong, at times stubborn, and zealous. Paul was refined and educated, formed by Gamaliel, one of the leading rabbis of the time. He was a Pharisee himself, a tentmaker, one who persecuted the Church because he thought it was an abomination of Jewish faith. Both were chosen at different times.

After the Lord’s Resurrection and Ascension—and after Peter came back to faith, having seen the Lord who asked him, “Do you love Me?” three times—and after Paul was literally knocked off his horse on the road to Damascus, these two men worked side by side as brothers in founding the Church in the mind and heart of the Holy Spirit.

How did they work side by side? How did they overcome their differences?

You see, my friends, there are three qualities I believe they showed. Those three qualities define a lifestyle—the lifestyle that synodality is all about.

First, both had to discover the power of humility. Can you imagine the tears Peter shed when he realized, at the end of it all, that he had betrayed the Lord to His face? In that silence, he recognized that for all the good and strength he had, without Christ he had nothing. Imagine the joy when he heard the Lord ask him, “Peter, do you love Me?” and recognized the extraordinary, awesome love God still had for him. To stand literally naked before the Lord in spirit, to recognize that it is Christ who animates, Christ who leads, Christ who is the heart of life—not him.

And the same is true for Paul. Can you imagine how he felt, literally knocked off his horse and blinded, to recognize that for all his knowledge and all he could say about the law and all the power he had to imprison Christians, in the end he had nothing—nothing without Christ. Think of the humility, the emptiness he had to offer, to allow Christ to enter in.

And so, my friends, that humility—that recognition of poverty in your life and mine without the Master and Savior—is the beginning.

Then, the second quality: to learn to listen from the heart. Not just to listen with the ear, not just to listen as the world wants us to, not just listening to compromise. It has nothing to do with that. It is listening from the heart so that we may hear the Holy Spirit speak, as Peter did in the moment of his betrayal, and as Paul did literally on his back on that empty, dusty road to Damascus. From those points, they continued to listen from the heart, and they were led to places they could never have imagined—Peter eating food he never thought the Lord would ask him to eat, Paul entering synagogues and proclaiming Christ the Messiah when, only a few years before, he was imprisoning those very people.

To listen to what the Holy Spirit had to tell them—for He is the source of truth. Not Peter, not Paul, not you, and not me.

And then, of course, it is their desire to bring the community together, to let all live in unity.

My friends, I said at the beginning of my homily that they overcame their differences, but in truth, they did not overcome their differences, nor will we. We cannot pretend we will all be the same, because we are not. Rather, it is to learn from our differences, to respect our differences, and to have in humility and listening the attitude that you might teach me something—something about life, about faith—that I could never learn from the limited life and view I have as who I am.

When we look at ourselves that way, unity becomes a beautiful evolution of the grandeur and beauty of God who lives in all of us—not despite our differences, but in part because of our differences.

In a world where humility is a rare possession, where many are deaf, and where we are not seeking unity but rather division, in that world—under the influence and grace of the Holy Spirit—Peter is asking us to live a synodal life.

As Leo said, it is a lifestyle. It is an attitude. It is a way of looking at each other and at the world. Peter and Paul understood that, and we are here because of them.

So as we try, you and I, to navigate this modern world—not everything modern is good—let us go back to the beginning and sit at the feet of Peter and Paul. Let us pray that we will discover again the power of humility before Christ’s love, learn to listen to each other from the heart, and recognize that our differences are our strength in the Holy Spirit.

And if we do that, we will discover what it means to be synodal. We will, more than that, discover the path on how to convert the whole world.