Peter and Paul. Giants, Pillars, the two chief Apostles. No one but Mary herself is greater in popular devotion or genuine significance. And here they are this morning, as they are each June 29, doubled-up, almost like Phillip and James, Simon and Jude. Those Apostles share a Feast Day, are doubled-up, it seems, because we know so little about them. All we know of Phillip is his inept request of Jesus: "Show us the Father!" Jesus responds with some wonder, maybe even exasperation, "Phillip! Have I been with you so long, and you still ask: Show us the Father? Do you not realize that in seeing me, you have seen the Father?" Other than that snippet, powerful and memorable as it is, we know nothing. Nothing. And his Feast-Day-partner James? We even call him James the Less. What a title! That was to distinguish him from James the Greater brother of John. We know that James the Greater was the first martyr, and that's it. But this James, James the Less—about him we know, well, less. Nothing in fact. And Simon and Jude? What do your really know about them? I know nothing, and I am not embarassed. The Church knows nothing about them. So, why are Peter and Paul doubled, bunched together as it were, like these virtually unknown Apostles, when we know so much about them, treasure them so, and revere them just below Mary herself? Well now, they do actually have individual days, those two Feasts Says in January, bracketing the same week—and those days say something very compelling and important. You see, those Feast Days, the Confession of Peter and the Conversion of Paul, are not about their lives and less about their deaths, but rather are about the two great moment in those lives, not about their personal biographies, but about their personal encounter with the Lord—what they said, what was said to them. That is where we are in this life—what do we say, what do we believe, how do we behave, how do we react, and what does our Lord say to us, what does he ask of us, what does he intend and plan and outline for us? What complete trust does he ask and inspire? How does he meet us, how do we respond? This, more than lionizing saints and commemorating their martyrdom dates and details seems to me to be of real lasting significance for us today. And so it is good and right that these two giants of our Faith, pillars of the early fragile Church, have day, a day together, today, a day shared, when we simply give thanks for their very existence, but also, each has another day - individual, unique, and so illuminating. Based on their life, and not their lives, based on who they were, and what they did, not simply how they died. They were, certainly, so different. Peter, uneducated, little traveled, a local Galilean, Paul highly literate, a worldly man of great culture, and though a devout Jew, also a legal Roman citizen. But they were so alike in what mattered—their faith, their witness, their love for their Lord. Fitting we should have a day for each, to focus on a single great, transforming moment in their lives and faith. And fitting that we should have a day, when they are together, joined, two equal giants, two to whom we owe the safety and wisdom and strength of the Church. A shared day, not really doubled-up at all. Without Peter, the Rock, without his faith and courage and lasting vision, the Church may well not have survived beyond that first generation. But even then, it would perhaps have survived as a small Galilean sect within Judaism, with meager outposts in Jerusalem and some of the Jewish areas of Greek cities. It was Paul, the great, the greatest missionary, who most fully fulfilled our Lord's parting command—proclaim the Gospel to the ends of the earth. We have legends that one Apostle took the Gospel to India, another to Armenia, still another to Egypt. But these are treasured legends. With Paul we know. He proclaimed the Gospel throughout the Empire. Today we do remember their deaths—Peter crucified, Paul beheaded. But that may not be what we are called to have always before us in our own vision of the Church and our roles in it. Some in our violent world, will be murdered for their faith. But perhaps not us. I doubt you will be called to undergo crucifixion, I doubt you will be asked to endure decapitation, but I bet, I know, you will be called to serve him faithfully as he asks, as he intends, as he makes clear. He will ask you, as he did Peter: "Who do you say that I am?" In everything you do and say in each and every action in how you behave, in how you treat others, in what you are all about, in all of that who are you saying Jesus is, for you? He waits for your Confession as he did for Peter's. And out of the noonday sun, he asks Paul why the zealous Pharisee is persecuting him. On that Day of his Conversion, we remember that Paul then asked him, "Who are you?" Today, now and forever we remember not only that he asks us who he is, but he invites you to ask him a direct and searing questions, But who are you? Just who are you Lord? What do you want, what are you asking of me, what do you intend for my life? What is your nature and the nature of your promise? Who are you Lord? In reply, I doubt he will say to you as he did to Peter: "You are The Rock on which I will build my Church." But he will surely say to you as he said to Paul. I am the Lord. Continue on, and I will, in my time, tell you what I ask of you, expect, require. Have faith, one day you will know. So, it seems you and I are, if not The Rock, we are still all little rocks all together. Not the One on whom the Church is founded, but yes, surely the ones on whom it now depends, in order to grow and flourish, to prosper and prevail to be faithful and to fulfill its ministry and mission as he intended and intends. We a rocks, upon whom he does, and will, build. And if we are unlike Paul, and not probably called to massive missionary journeys to the ends of the earth, we are, like Paul, wait, and continue, for the when he will tell us more. And we, most likely, liked Paul, be called to endure sufferings and hardships, calamities, and even figurative, if not literal, shipwrecks in our lives Above all, like Paul, we are called to fight the good fight, to keep the faith, to finish the race. Today we commemorate and revere Peter and Paul, faithful unto death, towering giants, massive pillars. Unsurpassed. But today we do more than remember them for their lives and facts of their martyrdoms. We also simply recall and reconsider anew a moment in each of those lives—that time when a question one was asked by Jesus, and that time when a question was asked of Jesus. And that for us is not an oddly doubled-up Feast once a year. That is our life and our call. That is our rock, our race, our faith and grace. Our hope and our glory, our duty, our joy, and our salvation. Peter and Paul together. Together this Sunday. You and I together each Sunday. All of us together with our Lord, with all of his questions of us, and ours of him—Who do you say that I am? Well, who are you? Asked, and answered, every day of our lives, each year of his grace. I am, it turns out, glad that Peter and Paul are combined on one single day—I need them both, but only and always together. The Church always knew that.