Therefore, it is necessary that one of the men
who accompanied us the whole time
the Lord Jesus came and went among us,
beginning from the baptism of John
until the day on which he was taken up from us,
become with us a witness to his resurrection.Acts 1:21–22
What task most marks an apostle of the Lord? We hear the answer to that question on the feast of St. Matthias the Apostle: an Apostle bears witness to the resurrection of the Lord.
Matthias is unique among the other eleven apostles because he was chosen to replace Judas, who had betrayed Jesus. As a matter of urgency, sometime in the ten days between the Ascension and Pentecost, Peter stood up. He spoke to the other apostles, Mary (Jesus’ mother), and other men and women who were disciples of the Lord, explaining to them the necessity of their task.
Peter had very specific criteria: Judas’ replacement needed to be a man who, like the rest of the Apostles, truly knew and accompanied the Lord during the entirety of his public ministry, his Paschal Mystery, and the Ascension when he returned to the Father. Most importantly, they needed Judas’ replacement to “become with us a witness to [Jesus’] Resurrection.” This would enable Judas’ replacement to fulfill the Great Commission alongside the other apostles - to teach all nations, baptize them, and teach them to observe all that Jesus had commanded.
Peter does not ask for the bravest man among them. He does not advocate for the most intelligent, the most charitable- or even the most trustworthy after Judas’ betrayal. He desires that the man who joins them shares in the joyful witness to the essential, life-altering reality of the Resurrection. He wants the newly appointed Apostle, chosen by the Lord, to know and share the essential message of how Jesus has saved and freed us with the entire world.
Hearing this language of prayerful choice for a successor might naturally lead us to think of the recent election of Pope Leo XIV.
In the coming days, our new Holy Father will face the scrutiny of the whole world. Who will he be? How will he respond to urgent matters that the Church faces? Will he agree or challenge our own personal theological leanings? How will he engage world leaders and world crises? How will he preach the Gospel?
The feast of St. Matthias reminds us that above all, we should pray that our new pope intimately knows the joy of the Gospel, so that as the successor of St. Peter and the apostles, down through many generations of apostolic succession, he too can share the love of the risen Lord. In his own way, we pray that Leo proclaims the essential message of Christian life: that “Jesus Christ loves you; he gave his life to save you; and now he is living at your side every day to enlighten, strengthen and free you” (Evangelli Gaudium 167).
May St. Matthias the Apostle, witness of the Resurrection, pray for us, too. Through his intercession, may we also share in the work of the apostles. May we proclaim with our lives the love that comes from knowing Christ died for us and rose to raise us up, in order to heal all that has been broken, seek all that has been lost, and to set our hearts aflame with the love that redeems the world.
Hope Zelmer
Hope Zelmer is a writer and a former theology teacher and campus minister at Fenwick High School, a Dominican Catholic preparatory school in Oak Park, Illinois. Hope has written for publications such as FaithND, Church Life Journal, and FemCatholic. She holds a BA and MA in Theology from the University of Notre Dame.