They shared a feast day—but not much else. When the Church’s two biggest saints had totally different visions for the future, what does it means for us today?
Why do Peter and Paul—two men who clearly didn’t always get along—share a feast day in the Catholic calendar? Yes, they are both considered giants of the early Christian movement, but their leadership styles, backgrounds, and theologies were wildly different. One was a fisherman who stumbled his way into leadership and never really stopped stumbling. The other was a highly educated Roman citizen who basically barged into the story after Jesus had already left the building, then proceeded to write half of what became the New Testament.
In this episode of Afterthoughts, we’re looking at those differences. More importantly, we’re going to discuss how those differences shaped the future of Christianity in ways most people have never been taught. The simple fact is that the version of Christianity we ended up with owes a lot more to Paul than to Peter. And that raises an interesting question: what might have happened if Paul had never joined the movement? What if Christianity had remained a small Jewish sect, led by folks like Peter and James, instead of becoming a global empire with Paul’s theology at the helm?
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