Sermon - Who do you say that I am?

The Grotto of Pan and gardens at Banias (Caesarea Phillipi)

A sermon given during Holy Communion (BCP) at St Giles-in-the-Fields at 11am on Sunday 29th June 2025 based on texts for the Feast of St Peter from the Book of Common Prayer.

If you walk straight through the British Museum, past the Rosetta Stone and those disputed marble statues, you’ll come face to face with a colossal Venus. She's surrounded by Roman gods, Greek heroes, and half-man, half-horse woodland spirits— a 3D catalogue of other people’s images of Gods.

Captivating, confusing and chaotic - and in some ways, not so different from the world we live in today.

We are fortunate to live so close and if you can muster the patience to pre-register for a free ticket these days, it’s still well worth dropping in to the museum on your way back home from church! It’s probably the closest we can get– in the present circumstances - to what the setting for today’s gospel reading looked like. A passage in which I think knowing something of that ‘place’ helps to understand the context of Peter’s confession then – and the implications of it for us in the here and now.

Caesarea Philippi was a theological theme park, of sorts.

Although there’s a key figure missing in our local version these days. Not Jupiter or Zeus - but Pan. A rendition of this muscular half man half goat generated impressive column-inches of faux-outrage (and huge crowds as a result) when it was put on public display at the museum a few years ago, having previously been part of a “reserved” collection in Naples. On loan for a few months, the lascivious little satyr was quietly repatriated to his original home.

Banias, the Arabic name for Caesaria Philippi - is so called because it had become a site of ritual devotion to the Greek God Pan since Alexander the Great passed through the neighbourhood. The shrine is located at the entrance to a huge cave, from which a spring gushes out of the earth that forms one of the tributaries of the River Jordan. Echoes here of Eden and of the heavenly city. A place of beginnings and endings.

All the water makes this a lush, green spot in the shade of Mount Hebron and it remains a public park today. A nature reserve with abundant bird life. The cooling effect of the water is pronounced and the sounds of the flowing river - and the constant hum of insects - makes a trip to Banias a multi-sensory experience. 

Winding paths through the woods lined with stalls selling refreshments, open out to form small glades - the perfect setting for Pan’s People to engage in secret trysts and whispers-in-the-ear. But the woods can also be dense, dark and ominous. Pan is said to have enjoyed hiding in spots like that, shaking the branches to frighten passers-by. Causing them to run away - in panic. Yes - as well as naughty sculptures Pan has bequeathed us that word.  

The woodland leads to a natural plateau at the foot of a cliff containing carved niches in the rock which, when Jesus and the disciples were walking here, would have contained statues of Pan and his nymphs. The remains of columns supporting temples to Augustus, Zeus and several to Pan himself can still be seen today. 

Banias – or Caesarea Philippi - was a marketplace of meaning. A place of recreation, relaxation, titillation, temptation - and worship with shrines to gods for every urge and appetite.

And it’s there – of all places – that Jesus chooses to bring the disciples and ask them - “who do people say that I am?” 

Standing in this multiple-choice place, this Disneyland of deities and desire, the disciples give a multiple-choice answer at first: 

Some say John the Baptist; others, Elijah; and others still, Jeremiah or another of the prophets. No statues to any of them at Banias - the Ten Commandments forbidding the creation of idols of course. 

But who do you say that I am? Jesus pushes them. 

Again, I wonder if the setting is significant here? For us as well as for Peter and the first disciples?

We too live surrounded by objects of worship – less obvious than statues of Gods perhaps, but just as dominant and pervasive. Success. Status. Self-fulfilment.

In the midst of which, who do we say that Jesus is – and what influences our answer?

At Caesarea Philippi - or in the British Museum - we are standing in the shadow of Roman statues of Greek gods. 

And it’s difficult for us not to talk about Jesus and God without being in the shadow of those ancient civilisations. When we speak about God, we often use words and concepts that have their root in Greek metaphysical thought, passed down to us by the Romans. Our understanding of love. Of omnipotence. Of providence. The list goes on.

This way of thinking influences our minds direction of travel as well as our language – but often below the surface – something unseen and unnoticed. 

Can we speak about Jesus today without relying on the inherited language and concepts shaped by centuries of Greek and Roman influence—concepts that often go unquestioned?

This year marks the seventeen hundredth anniversary of the formation of the Nicene Creed – an important statement of belief that we said together a moment ago – and which profoundly affects how we conceptualise and speak about the person of Jesus.

It’s valid to consider – especially in light of our gospel reading today - how much we rely on such statements and tradition to inform the way in which we answer the question of who Jesus is to us.

Thinking critically in this way is not to devalue or deny such texts or traditions but to draw greater insights from and appreciation of them, by encouraging an openness to the spirit of the Living God speaking to us today – so that we answer more fully – and truly - in our own words.

Can we respond to Jesus’s question as Peter did?

But who do you say that I am? Jesus asks Peter and the disciples, this band of faithful Jewish believers standing in the physical shadow of Greek and Roman thought and practice; as the statues of Pan, Zeus and countless Roman Emperors gaze on.
 

Peter is the first to reply; what we call his ‘Confession’:

“Thou art Christ, the Son of the living God,” he says.

 
Jesus makes clear how extraordinary this statement is. After blessing Simon-Peter, he explains that Peter’s confession has come not from ‘flesh and blood’ but from the inspiration of God himself.

Peter’s confession is not simply a cleverly worded product of his Jewish heritage and understanding of the Messiah, or the influence of Greco-Roman thought about the deification of human beings. But a truth inspired by the living God spoken through Peter.

Here, in this place of beginnings and endings the rock hewn with Gods of every kind – a crowded and contradictory pantheon of chaos Peter, moved by the Spirit, names Jesus as the Son of the one, true, ‘living’ God. Not because it made sense, or it was the safe, well rehearsed answer spoken by rote, but because it was true.

And on that truth – spoken from the heart, not borrowed from others, Jesus makes Peter the ‘rock’ on which this new understanding – this revelation - will be manifest and spread throughout the world. This is our church.

Declaring who Christ is was the key to unlocking that new understanding – the key to the Kingdom of Heaven. Not through borrowed words, philosophical rhetoric or second-hand belief. But by Peter opening his heart to the living God who speaks through him. Being open to the outworking of the Spirit and answering Jesus’ question for himself.

The church is built on that confession.

Not an explanation.

Not an argument.

But a personal declaration of truth.

The truth of who Jesus is.

Our reading from Acts shows us how Peter was prepared to die for that truth. Elsewhere the scriptures reveal his faith was not quite so steadfast – we find Peter faltering, sometimes dramatically. He denied Jesus, misunderstood him and stumbled more than once. But Jesus knew Peter’s weaknesses, as he knows ours. And Jesus still trusted Peter with the keys to the Kingdom.    

Because Peter’s calling – like ours – was not to perfect understanding, but to faithful seeking. A faith that wrestles and wonders, that may question, challenge deny or drift and still be drawn back, by grace.

As he stood in a place where Jewish, Greek and Roman thought converged, Peter challenged the influences that limited his understanding of who Jesus is - and opened his mind to new possibilities and means of expression. 

As he stood in a place designed to cater for every human desire, Peter recognised the only path to true fulfilment that God has promised is through Christ.

As he stood in this place of multiple-choice deities, Peter named Jesus as the son of the one true God.

And we are invited to do the same.

In our world of fluid identities and carefully curated narratives invented to explain them - and surrounded by diverse objects of worship, St Peter’s example encourages us to embrace the freedom to answer not only in the polished words of texts and traditions but also to hear the voice of the living word speaking through us, when Jesus asks:

Who do you say that I am?

What will we say in reply?