Dedication of the Basilica of St. John Lateran in Rome
Ezekiel 47:1-2, 8-9, 12; 1 Corinthians 3:9c-11, 16-17; John 2:13-22
This weekend, the church celebrates the feast of the dedication of the Basilica of St. John on the Lateran Hill in Rome. Most Catholics, and indeed most people, presume St. Peter’s Basilica in Rome is Catholicism’s principal church and Rome’s cathedral, but this distinction goes to St. John’s Basilica on Rome’s Lateran Hill, or St. John Lateran.
St. John Lateran is the cathedral of the bishop of Rome. As such, the basilica is the visible symbol of the place that the bishop of Rome holds in the Catholic world and has held since St. Peter — whom Jesus appointed to lead the Christian community, as Scripture records (Mt 216:18) — settled in Rome.
The first reading, from Ezekiel, speaks of the temple in Jerusalem, and of a spring that flows from the southern side of the temple. Each reference has a lesson.
At the time of Ezekiel, and throughout the history of God’s people, the devout regarded the Jerusalem temple as God’s earthly dwelling. The land was arid. Water was precious, since it was so scarce but so vital to life. So, a spring was a blessed sight.
In this reading, the temple, God’s dwelling place, overflows with water. So great was the flow that the water poured across a great distance to the Dead Sea itself. Reaching the Dead Sea, the temple’s water brought life to a body of salt water in which no living creature could survive.
St. Paul’s First Epistle to the Corinthians provides the second reading. In this reading, Paul says that each Christian is a living temple, a human repository of God’s holy presence. Therefore, each person is holy.
For the last reading, the church turns to St. John’s Gospel. It is one of the most familiar readings in the New Testament.
The story is about the Lord’s arrival in the Jerusalem temple and finding men selling cattle, sheep, and pigeons. As is well-known, Jesus drove these merchants away.
While it is intriguing to divert into discussions about the Lord’s temper, realizing that indeed Jesus was a human with human emotions, this passage declares the divine lordship of Christ. Jesus expressly refers to God as “Father.”
The temple belonged to God. It was God’s house. Jesus showed dominion over this house by turning the salesmen out. It is easy to capitalize on those salesmen who used religious devotion as an opportunity for their own financial gain, but the principal lesson is that Jesus is God, and that the temple was sacred as God’s repose among humans.
Jesus is the true temple, the true repository of God among humans. Jesus rose from the dead. He lives forever.
Reflection
St. John’s Gospel clearly teaches that Jesus was a human living among humans, but also, that Jesus was God. This fundamental point about Jesus further reveals that God was, and is, visible and active in human society.
God is the source of life and strength that brings peace, joy and hope even in deadly conditions such as the Dead Sea. God’s life-giving power always prevails.
The faithful Christian, reborn in the water of baptism, possesses this life of God, given by the Holy Spirit, through the redemption of Christ — assuring that death, in the sense of eternal death, will never come.
Jesus was visible before people 2,000 years ago. He still is visible. He still speaks. He still proclaims the glory of God. He still nourishes through the Eucharist, still forgives and still comforts the distressed.
He lives, acts and speaks through the visible, institutional church, gathered around Peter, whose current successor — Pope Leo XIV, the 267th — worships, presides and teaches in the Basilica of St. John Lateran.