This is the edited text of the Homily for the Paschal Eucharist, Sixth Sunday of Easter (Year C), St Mary’s Cathedral, Sydney, 25 May 2025.
In 1963, at the height of the Cold War, US President John F Kennedy gave his “Peace Speech” as the commencement address at American University in Washington DC. In the shadow of the Cuban Missile Crisis of eight months before, when the world teetered on the edge of nuclear catastrophe, Kennedy chose an audience of students at a Christian university to outline his vision for a more peaceful world.
The president argued that peace must be a pragmatically attainable reality, not just a distant utopian ideal. Not a peace imposed with weapons or threat of Armageddon. “Not the peace of the grave or the security of the slave.” But “a genuine peace, the kind that makes life worth living, the kind that enables men and nations to grow, and to hope, and to build a better life for their children.” He stressed that that required more than disarmament and diplomacy. A transformation of people’s perceptions, attitudes and behaviour was needed, above all mutual recognition of our shared humanity. Whatever our differences, he said, “we all inhabit this [same] small planet. We all breathe the same air. We all cherish our children’s future. And we are all mortal.”
Thankfully, nuclear war did not break out during that perilous period. Yet the kind of peace that Kennedy called for has yet to be achieved, 60 years later. Wars still rage across continents. We are especially conscious of those in Israel-Gaza and Ukraine-Russia, but there are many more. Enough for the late Pope Francis to designate ours “a piecemeal World War III.” Nuclear powers continue to stare down one another while spending trillions of dollars a year on armaments. Division and hostility deepen rather than diminish. Yet as wars are manmade, so must be peace, Kennedy claimed, for “no problem of human destiny is beyond human beings” to solve.
I’m not so sure about that. Faced with such persistent conflict, we must ask whether peace is beyond human reach. Doesn’t history demonstrate that human beings are hardwired for division and rivalry, conflict and violence? That no leader, no speech, no peace process, however inspired, is enough to forge a lasting concord? Even in the early Church, where the disciples were “of one heart and mind”, devoted to the apostolic faith, the Eucharist and the brotherhood, holding all things in common, praising God and earning the favour of all (Acts 2:42-47; 4:32-35)—even then, we hear in our first reading today, there were antagonisms, disagreements, growing pains (Acts 15:1-2,22-29).
In the Gospel of John we encounter another “Peace Speech” (Jn 14:23-29). It is a farewell discourse rather than a commencement address. Instead of university students, the audience are fishermen turned fishers-of-men. Delivering the speech is not a temporary ruler with access to nuclear codes talking up world peace, but a king “not of this world,” speaking of an altogether different kind of peace. Not a result of armistice negotiations, disarmament treaties, democratic consensus—important as these are. Not the uneasy Pax Romana imposed by force in Jesus’ day or by any superpower since. No, the peace of which Christ speaks, is not generated by us. It is not Kennedy’s elusive manmade peace.
Rather, Jesus says, it is pure grace, sheer gift, from Him. “Peace, I bequeath to you, my own peace I give you. A peace the world cannot give, this is my gift to you. I have said these things to you,” Jesus explains later in the discourse, “that in me you may have peace. In the world you will have tribulation. But take heart: I have overcome the world!” (Jn 16:33) And because it is His own peace—the harmony of the Prince of Peace (Isa 9:6)—it is inexhaustible, unshakable, divine. It is “peace on earth and good will to all men,” as the angels sang at His birth (Lk 2:14). It is “the peace of God, which transcends all understanding,” as the apostles proclaimed to the first Christian converts (Phil 4:7).
Those who enjoy and express this peace, Jesus beatifies and adopts as His siblings: “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called children of God.” (Mt 5:9)
That Jesus offers this Peace Speech, on the very eve of His Passion, is no accident. It reminds us that though it is pure gift, it comes at a price, a price to Jesus Himself. It is beyond us to stop the endless cycles of rivalry, hatred, recriminations. But by accepting all this and responding, not aggressively, not even defensively, as any human being would, but divinely, with forgiveness even for those who were torturing Him (Lk 23:34), Jesus conquered his enemies by turning them into friends, with a love that conquers even death. Hearts full of the anger, anxiety or animus that feeds the disharmony between people, are offered healing: “Let not your hearts be troubled or afraid,” He says today (Jn 14:27)[iii] And with hearts thus changed, the Risen One’s first words and first gift to us is: “Peace be with you.” (Lk 24:36; Jn 20:19,21,26)
Whilst Christ’s peace is pure gift, it provokes a response. “If you love me, you will keep my commandments,” Jesus says today (Jn 14:23).[iv] “Peace be with you! As the Father sent me, now I am sending you.” (Jn 20:21) If we learn the lesson of the Holy Cross and Empty Tomb, if we receive the gift of the Holy Spirit into our hearts, we will live that lesson and impart that spirit ourselves. For after I’m gone “the Holy Spirit, the Advocate, will remind you of all I’ve taught you,” Jesus says. He will enable you too be harbingers of harmony. As Paul tells us, “the Spirit’s gifts are patience, kindness and goodness, faithfulness, gentleness and self-control, love, joy and peace” (Gal 5:22–23).
The first words of Pope Leo XIV to us, upon his election as Pontiff, were Christ’s Easter words, “Peace be with you.” His prayer for us was that we would know Christ’s peace. In his homily last Sunday for the inauguration of his Petrine ministry, the Holy Father echoed St Augustine’s vision of the Church as a family of brothers and sisters dwelling in harmony with their neighbours. The Church, he said, must be “a sign of unity and communion,” looking to Christ with humility and enjoying the power of the Holy Spirit to build a lasting peace amongst people.
Dear brothers and sisters, newly joined to the Body of Christ at Easter, hear His words charge to you today, to be peace-makers, peace-livers, peace-spreaders. God led each of you along a unique path to Himself at Easter. Through the RCIA and Church community, the Word of God and the sacraments, you have encountered the Prince of Peace. Now share that Gospel with others. And may the peace of Christ, that surpasses all understanding, keep your hearts and minds in the love and knowledge of Christ Jesus. (Cf.Phil 4:7)
, St Mary’s Cathedral, Sydney, 25 May 2025.){kind=link}