Our weekday readings from the Acts of the Apostles and from John’s Gospel end on these last days of the Easter Season. Today’s reading from Luke describes Paul’s two final years in Rome (Acts 28:16-20,30-31), There he preaches to everyone who came to him “with complete assurance and without hindrance”, even though he’s under house arrest, and so the gospel is now preached in Rome, the center of the world.

Readings from John’s Gospel these last days end with Jesus’ prediction of Peter’s death and John’s role as a witness to the gospel, and the important reminder “There are also many other things that Jesus did, but if these were to be described individually, I do not think the whole world would contain the books that would be written.” (John 25 ) 

Strange, though, that Luke, who describes the death of Stephen the deacon in great detail, says nothing about the deaths of Peter and Paul. He certainly knew the circumstances of their martyrdom in 62 or 63 AD, some years before he wrote Acts.Why didn’t he write about it? It might have cleared up a lot of questions about their deaths that some modern historians have raised. 

Perhaps Luke did not want to draw attention to that tragic time when Nero’s persecution put so many innocent Christians to death? Not the time to open those wounds? 

We have the graves and remains of Peter and Paul at the Vatican and outside Rome’s walls, but no account of their death that someone like Luke could give. I wonder why he didn’t write about it.

More importantly, both Luke in Acts and John in his gospel want to remind us that following Jesus Christ means following him into the mystery of his death and resurrection.