The entire Church participates in the redeeming mission of Christ the Priest, "and its fulfillment is entrusted to all members of the People of God who, through the sacraments of initiation, become sharers in the priesthood of Christ to offer a spiritual sacrifice to God and to bear witness to Jesus Christ before men"7.
All the lay faithful participate in this priesthood of Christ, although in a way that is essentially different, and not only in degree, from that of priests. With a truly priestly soul, they sanctify the world through their secular tasks, carried out with human perfection, and they seek the glory of God in everything: the mother of a family carrying out her household duties, the soldier setting an example of love for the homeland mainly through military virtues, the businessman making the company progress and living social justice... All of them making reparation for the sins committed every day in the world, offering their lives and their daily work in the Holy Mass.
Priests—Bishops and presbyters—have been expressly called by God, "not to be separated from the people or from any man, but to be totally consecrated to the work to which the Lord calls them. They could not be ministers of Christ if they were not witnesses and dispensers of a life other than the earthly one, nor could they serve if they remained strangers to the life and conditions of the people"8. The priest has been chosen from among men to be invested with a dignity that causes awe even to the angels, and then returned to men to serve them, especially in what pertains to God, with a peculiar and unique mission of salvation. In many circumstances, the priest takes the place of Christ on earth: he has Christ’s power to forgive sins, he teaches the way to Heaven... and above all, he lends his voice and his hands to Christ at the sublime moment of the Holy Mass: in the Sacrifice of the Altar, he consecrates in persona Christi, acting in the person of Christ. There is no dignity comparable to that of the priest. "Only the divine motherhood of Mary surpasses this divine ministry"9.
The priesthood is an immense gift that Jesus Christ has given to his Church. The priest is "an immediate and daily instrument of that saving grace that Christ has won for us. If this is understood, if it has been meditated upon in the active silence of prayer, how can the priesthood be considered a renunciation? It is a gain that cannot be calculated. Our Holy Mother Mary, the holiest of creatures—greater than her, only God—brought Jesus into the world once; priests bring Him to our earth, to our body and to our soul, every day: Christ comes to feed us, to give us life, to be, even now, a pledge of the future life"10.
Today is a day to thank Jesus for such a great gift. Thank you, Lord, for the calls to the priesthood that you direct to men every day! And we resolve to treat them with more love, with more reverence, seeing in them Christ passing by, who brings us the most precious gifts a man can desire. He brings us eternal life.
HCD