The first followers of Jesus never stopped considering themselves as Jews. Jesus was the Jewish Messiah and they were living out their Jewish faith in light of God’s intervention in the life and ministry of Jesus. The success of the mission among the Gentiles, the non-Jews, caused them to re-think what their faith in Jesus meant. Did the Death and Resurrection of Jesus not create a new way of living for God! As the Jewish and non-Jewish followers of Jesus interacted in the metropolis of Antioch that they realized that they had become something other. It was in Antioch that the disciples were first called Christians. Centuries later Antioch (today called Antakya) is in the Moslem country of Turkey. However there is still a strong memory of the city as the early hub of Christianity with no less than five traditions (Greek Orthodox, Syrian Orthodox, Marionate Catholic, Melkite Catholic and Syrian Catholic) proclaiming that their leader is the patriarch of the city as successor to St. Peter.
