The Footprints of God: Peter Keeper of the Keys (2003)

Author and apologist Steve Ray follows the Church's Sacred Tradition and the Sacred Scripture accounts in the historical footsteps of the life and ministry of Simon Peter, the head of the Apostles. The story begins with the small town of Bethsaida by the see of Galilee where Simon Peter grew up and lived with his brother Andrew earning his living by fishing, describing the living conditions of the time and tools of trade based on archeological discoveries. The story then takes us to the neighbouring town of Capernaum and the house of Peter where he lived with his family and where Jesus stayed most of his three-year ministry, where Peter attended the synagogue and heard Jesus' teaching; then to the district of Caesarea Philippi where Simon was given the new name of Peter, the Rock against an important backdrop of the landscape; then to Mount Tabor where Christ's Transfiguration took place; then back to the Sea of Galilee, to the church built over a rock called Mensa Christi (The Table of Christ), the spot where Jesus cooked the fish for the Apostles after his Resurrection and gave Peter the power to be his Vicar on Earth; then to Jerusalem, the city of the Jewish kings and the royal stewards, the keepers of the keys of the kingdom, the Upper Room, the Church Council of Jerusalem; to town of Joppa and the house of Simon the Tanner, where Peter received his revelation regarding the law of uncleanliness; to the city of Caesaria where Peter baptised the first gentile - a roman centurion Cornelius and his family; and finally, to Rome to Saint Peter's Basilica built on the site of Peter's crucifixion and burial where he was the first Pope for the final twenty-five years of his life and the Cathedral of Saint John Lateran where Peter's chair is located, the authority traced back 3,500 years into history to Moses.