A Roman calendar of the year 354 already lists February 22 as the natale Petri de cathedra, making this one of the oldest observances in the Roman liturgy. The chair, or cathedra, is the seat from which a bishop teaches, and the word survives in the name of a diocese's principal church, the cathedral. The feast therefore celebrates the Petrine ministry itself: the unity of faith and communion for which Christ prayed and which he founded on the confession of Peter. The Gospel of the day is Matthew's account at Caesarea Philippi — Peter's confession that Jesus is the Christ, the Son of the living God, and the Lord's reply that on this rock he will build his Church and will give him the keys of the kingdom. The first reading is Peter's own exhortation to the elders of the Church to tend the flock of God willingly, not lording it over those in their charge. White vestments are worn, and the Preface of the Apostles is used. In the apse of Saint Peter's Basilica an ancient wooden chair, long venerated as connected with the apostle, is enclosed in the bronze monument of the Cathedra Petri made by Bernini. The image is instructive: the visible seat is hidden inside a work of art that shows it upheld by the Doctors of the Church and lit by the Holy Spirit. Catholics commonly mark the day by praying for the Pope, and the feast provides a natural occasion for catechesis on the primacy and on the Church's teaching about the successor of Peter as the perpetual and visible source of unity among the bishops and the faithful.

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February 22

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