As part of my application to the Diocese for Sponsorship in a Program of Priestly Formation (seminary), I had to write a short essay on what the priesthood means to me. Here it is for your reading:
What does the priesthood mean to me?
I once had to teach a few small children about the Sacrament of Reconciliation. In the analogy I used, priests were represented by mechanics. Mechanics who were hand-picked by the Ultimate Mechanic to be His workers. A Mechanic can’t do anything without the proper tools, parts, and above all knowledge. In the analogy, the mechanics received all the tools, parts, and knowhow from the Ultimate Mechanic, God Himself!
I want to focus on the meaning of the word Priest. In our society, the supernatural aspect of the word “Priest” has been dimmed by centuries of common use. A Priest, by definition, is someone who stands between the people and their God. Who intercedes and offers sacrifice on their behalf. He is a bridge between Heaven and Earth. The fact that a priest’s primary responsibility and privilege is to offer sacrifice to the Lord cannot be overemphasized!
In the Old Testament, Yahweh’s priests (priests of the Old Covenant) offered Him burnt offerings of animals: bulls, rams, goats, sheep, and lambs. Their priesthood could be considered a one-way road; they offered things to God, but (though God did bless His people abundantly) there was no flow through them from God to His people.
In the Priesthood of Jesus Christ (or, the Priesthood of the New and Everlasting Covenant), it is very truly a two-way highway. The priest still offers Sacrifice to the Father (now the word is capitalized because of the supreme dignity of the sacrifice our priests offer), but now God also uses them directly and definitively to pour out His gifts to his people. Through the Sacraments, we are blessed so abundantly. The power of the Holy Spirit is made available everyday to strengthen and support God’s Church.
Because of his extraordinary calling, a priest must be an example of total commitment to God and His Kingdom. As Pope Benedict has said, “The priesthood is a transfer of ownership, a being taken out of the world and given to God.” By virtue of his gift of direct interaction (through the Sacraments) with Heaven, he must be (far beyond detachment from the temptations of this world) an Alter Christus. Imitating Christ in His example of true love, he must give his entire self (emphasis on entire) to God for his neighbor, first, for the sake of God, His Kingdom, and the priest’s salvation, and secondarily, as an example of Christian Life for the laity to follow.
There are many other aspects of priesthood which are (obviously) important, but we must remember their first and most important task is to offer sacrifice to God. We must remember this before we even consider the others because all the others depend on this sacrifice. We are an ecclesia de Eucharistia! The Sacrifice that is offered again and again to the Father in a stream of unending love is the “source and summit of Christian Life,“ (CCC 1324). Without priests, there is no Eucharist, and without the Eucharist, there is no Church.
The world needs God—not just any god but the God of Jesus Christ, the God who made Himself flesh and blood, who loved us to the point of dying for us, who rose and created within Himself room for man. This God must live in us and we in Him. This is our priestly call: only in this way can our action as priests bear fruit.
Pope Benedict XVI
