Jesus

  • Our Mission

    St. Peter's Church'To reunite all his children, scattered and led astray by sin, the Father willed to call the whole of humanity together into his Son's Church. The Church is the place where humanity must rediscover its unity and salvation. The Church is "the world reconciled." She is that bark which "in the full sail of the Lord's cross, by the breath of the Holy Spirit, navigates safely in this world." According to another image dear to the Church Fathers, she is prefigured by Noah's ark, which alone saves from the flood.' (CCC 845)

     

  • Prayer for the Salvation of Israel

    Yeshua, Messiah of IsraelLORD, that which You have given us, give to all Israel. May all Israel discover the sweet gentleness and sublimity of the Messiah, who is still waiting, and has already been with us for twenty centuries, Yeshua, the Lord. And together with the Messiah, may Israel discover the stunning beauty of the Good News that comes from heaven, the New Covenant capable of bringing to Israel the peace of her God, shalom upon Jerusalem.

  • Purim and Lent: Haman Hung, Christ Crucified

    Jews celebrating PurimPurim is a day of ecstatic rejoicing, which the Jews celebrate as both a sign of G-d’s enduring love and a promise of their final salvation. There’s nothing in the holiday that contradicts Christian faith, except for one thing: it usually falls out smack in the middle of Lent.

  • Reconciling Gospel and Torah: The Catechism

    Cardinal RatzingerThe history of the relationship between Israel and Christendom is drenched with blood and tears. It is a history of mistrust and hostility, but also - thank God - a history marked again and again by attempts at forgiveness, understanding and mutual acceptance...  Can Christian faith, left in its inner power and dignity, not only tolerate Judaism but accept it in its historic mission? Or can it not? Can there be true reconciliation without abandoning the faith, or is reconciliation tied to such abandonment?

  • Saved! Ronda Chervin's Conversion to the Catholic Faith

    Ronda ChervinAs right wing political atheists of a Jewish ancestry, we didn't fit in with anyone around us: not with Catholics, not with the sprinkling of Protestants, certainly not with Orthodox religious Jews in full regalia, nor Reform Jews, nor Zionist atheist Jews, nor left-wing non-Zionist Jews. Later, as a Catholic, I realized that my desire to belong to an identifiable group forever and ever had a psychological as well as a theological reason.

  • St. Anne and the Pools of Bethesda

    The Church of St. AnneThe Church of St. Anne is known as the birthplace of the Blessed Virgin Mary. It is situated right next to the pool of Bethesda, a popular healing center in Roman times and the place where Jesus healed a paralytic as recorded in the Gospel of John.

  • The Divinity of the Messiah

    Christ PantocratorIs the Messiah to be a mere man, as is commonly thought in traditional Judaism, or is he divine, as it is held by Christians? Did the concept of a divine Messiah derive from Greek pagan influences, or is it rooted in the Bible? Is it a New Testament innovation or can we find hints and traces of this idea throughout the Hebrew Bible and Jewish literature? Read about the divinity of the Messiah in the Patristic writings, in the New Testament, and in the Hebrew Scriptures and Jewish literature.

  • The Foundations of Three Temple Theology

    The Temple in JerusalemA Temple is a seat of Divine Presence. In Judaism, there are two Temples, one for the dimension of time, the Sabbath, and one for the dimension of space, the Temple in Jerusalem. Christianity adds a third, the Son of G-d incarnate in the nature of man.

  • The Mass and the Eucharist

    Consecration of the Eucharist Welcome to this short introduction to the celebration of the Holy Mass! The Eucharist is the source and summit of the Christian life and its highest and most important prayer. In the Mass the whole mystery of our salvation is made present, and in the Eucharist we receive the Body and Blood of Jesus our Lord, who is really and truly present under the appearance of bread and wine and who gives himself to us in this great gift of love.

  • The Messiah in the Tanakh

    jesus-jew-praying-th Can we get a good idea of who is the Jewish Messiah from the Old Testament and the Jewish writings? Study the messianic prophecies of the Old Testament in the light of Jewish apocryphal literature, the Aramaic targums, the Midrash, the Talmud, medieval Jewish Bible commentators, and the Zohar.

  • The Palestinian Kairos Document: An Analysis

    Kairos PalestineThe self-styled “Kairos Palestine” document was launched in Bethlehem on December 11,2009 by a panel chaired by the former Latin Patriarch of Jerusalem,Michel Sabbah. The document is meant to mobilize churches worldwide in a program of boycotts, divestment and delegitimization directed at the State of Israel.

  • The River of Ezekiel's Temple

    River of living water A study of the river flowing from Ezekiel's Temple (Ezek 47:1-12) and its underlying themes: Jerusalem and Zion as the Lord's cosmic mountain; water as a prophetic sign of eschatological healing; the Garden of Eden.  The Feast of Tabernacles and its water libation ceremony in the Temple actualized these themes and anticipated God's future outpouring of the Holy Spirit.  Jesus' words uttered during the same feast show that he identified himself with Ezekiel's temple and is the giver of the waters of life – the Holy Spirit. The eschatology of the book of Revelation and the vision of "a pure river of water of life" proceeding from the throne of God recapitulate and expand Ezekiel's vision by incorporating the other prophetic themes and Jesus' self-revelation.

  • The Sacrament of Reconciliation (Confession)

    ConfessionConfession (or “reconciliation”) is the sacrament where Baptized Catholics receive forgiveness from God’s mercy for the offense committed against him, and are reconciled with the Church which they have wounded by their sins. It is the place where you meet the risen Jesus, who gave the apostles - the first priests - the power to forgive sins in his name (John 20:23).

  • The Story of Salvation

    Salvation History This article presents an overview of salvation history, covering creation, the fall, God's covenants with Israel and with mankind, the coming of the Messiah, and the one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church which He has founded.

  • The Tendencies of Evangelicalism

    Worship Are you an evangelical Christian or a Messianic Jew? What makes Evangelicalism so attractive?  What is the recipe for its success? What are the tensions and problems inherent in Evangelical Christianity?  Does Messianic Judaism provide a solution or does it add new problems? If you are an Evangelical, in which direction is your faith tending: Stagnation/unbelief, liberalism, fundamentalism, or Catholicism? What are the main stumbling blocks that keep good believers from entering into the fullness of truth?

  • Why Be Catholic?

    St. Peter's Basilica Do you sometimes feel like there is something missing to your faith? Do you have a desire of becoming a part of the Church that Jesus originally founded? What does it mean to be "Catholic"? What does the Catholic Church have to offer that cannot be found in any other denomination? What are ten (plus one) good reasons for being or becoming a Catholic?

  • Why Don't (Most) Jews Believe in Jesus?

    Jews for Jesus on a missionI have recently returned to Jerusalem after an absence of seven months abroad.  During this time, I had many conversations with Catholic friends about Judaism. To many of them it seems incredible that most Jews still "don't get it" that the Messiah has come. The present reflection is addressed to Christians who wish to better understand the rationale for the Jewish rejection of Jesus and of the Church and wish to try to see the perspective from the "other side."

  • Why Jesus?

    Jesus A short overview of the Gospel message: God loves us and wishes to give us a share in His divine life. Though we have broken His covenant by sinning, Jesus has come to reconcile us to God. He has established the Catholic Church to restore us to God and to impart to us His forgiveness, salvation, and eternal life of love.

FaLang translation system by Faboba

Latest Articles

Antoine Levy - 17 February 2024

When we meet cats who grin, that is, people who are naturally nice and warm, we tend to think that they are good people. A grin of the sort gives itself out as an implicit promise of support in time of need. Somebody whom we identify as empathic will be most likely to help. What is very curious is realizing that certain people's cordial grin amounts to...

Gavin D'Costa - 12 February 2024

The unconditional gift of the election of the Jewish people is the theological foundation of Catholic Zionism. Many New Testament texts support the notion that Catholics should endorse ­Zionism. Jesus himself was a Jewish Christian ­Zionist. Catholics accept that the Jewish people still have a providential role to play, and their return to the land of...

Gerald McDermott - 09 February 2024

Critics of Christian Zionism usually dismiss it for one of three reasons: (1) They say it contradicts the New Testament, which replaces the Old Testament focus on a particular land by the vision of a whole world; (2) They think it is the exclusive concern of premillennial dispensationalists; (3) It is said to be more political than theological, attached to...

Yehuda - 04 February 2024

On the one hand, there is the Christian message of unconditional love and its emphasis on self-sacrifice at the hands of those who hate you unjustly: "No one can have greater love than to lay down his life for his friends." On the other hand, there is the logic of war: you want to liquidate those who hate you to the point of murdering your nation by all...

Gerald McDermott - 29 December 2023

Gerald McDermott explores the notion of supersessionism in Christian theology, which suggests the promises made to the Jewish people in the Old Testament, including the land promise, have been superseded by the Christian church. This view has dominated Christian interpretation since the fourth century, leading to the marginalization of the New Testament's...

André Villeneuve - 20 December 2023

Dr. André Villeneuve discusses the role of Israel in the age of the Church on Michael Lofton's "Reason and Theology" podcast. Topics include God's covenant with Israel, supersessionism, the idea of the Church as "new Israel", Israel's role in the age of the Church, the modern state of Israel, Zionism, the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, and Israel's role in...