WHO IS THE PRIEST AND WHAT DOES HE DO?
by Fr. John Dresko
If we were to sum up in one sentence what an ordained priest is supposed to be in the theological vision of the Orthodox Church, it would be this: A priest (or bishop) is the one chosen by God to make present Christ in His Holy Church. The union between God and man, which was broken in the sin of Adam of Eve, is restored by the incarnation, death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Reunion with God becomes possible by our relationship with His Son. This union with Christ is what makes the Church the Church. The assurance of the presence of Christ in the Church is what makes the Holy Priesthood (as a sacramental office) possible. The Church is the assembly living in Christ and all that Christ has is given to us. We, as the Church or the Body of Christ, to use St. Paul's terminology, share in the fulness of the Kingdom of God and we manifest that Kingdom every time we gather in His Name. The Church becomes the reality of Christ Christ is the Head, the Church is the Body; Christ is the Bridegroom, the Church is the Bride; Christ is the new Adam, the Church is the new Eve. To be saved, we are called to do the same works that Christ did. But Christ must be present and manifest in all that the Church does; with His presence, the Church is transformed from an earthly gathering into the Kingdom of God.
But while the Orthodox Church understands the priest as the sacramental presence of Christ in the Church, it must also be understood that there is only one Priest and one Christ that Priest and that Christ is manifest in the sacramental priesthood. Christ is present in the Church in all His fulness and the ordained priest is the guarantee of that presence. The man called to the priesthood must present the ideal reality of Christ. A man who would be a priest does not deform that reality morally or theologically he has nothing outstanding that would be a stumbling block to making Christ present. When a man is ordained a priest, he receives the following "Job Description" on his Certificate of Ordination:
...we [the bishop and the Church] have confirmed unto him the power to perform the Holy Mysteries upon man for his Christian and spiritual life: to baptize, to chrismate, to confess, to serve the Liturgy, to join in marriage according to the will and consent of the man and wife, to perform the unction of oil upon the sick, and never to presume to do so on the healthy, and to conduct all Church orders and services as Christ's celebrant and the minister of the Divine Mysteries. It behooves the priest, by our injunction, and by his own duty, to observe diligently the reading of the Divine Scriptures, and not to interpret them other than as the Church luminaries, our holy and God-bearing fathers, pastors and teachers have interpreted them with great consensus; and, according to the Apostle's testament, to be sober, chaste, pious, honorable, hospitable, instructive; not a drinker or a violent man, not quarrelsome, not an avaricious person; but meek, not envious, not a lover of money; one who keeps an orderly home, who keeps his children in obedience and purity, as the same Apostle writes to Timothy; to renounce vile and vain fables, instructing himself in piety; to be an image to the faithful in word, life, love, spirit, faith and purity. Especially it behooves him to instruct the faithful people to be pure in faith and to obey the commandments of God; to do every Christian good work every day, and especially on Sunday, the Day of Resurrection, as the nineteenth canon of the Sixth Ecumenical Council decrees; to bind and to loose with good judgment those confessing their consciences to him according to the norms of the Holy Orthodox Church, and according to our admonition and injunction; to bring to our knowledge greater and more complex faults. It is our instruction to him to presume in no way to leave the temple, to which he has been blessed and at which he has been enjoined to serve, without our blessing, according to the third canon of the Antiochian Council. In like manner, also, the presbyters are to read diligently and often the liturgical orders required of them, and to fulfill them.
And if the priest does not live up to his "Job Description," then he must answer to God and the Church for his failure, which is a much worse fate than answering to the parish council:
If the priest himself begins to live without fear, and to act in a manner unbecoming the priesthood, to drink or to blaspheme, or to become mercenary; to stand apart from his brethren, or otherwise to be disorderly, or does not tend carefully his Church or his flock, he shall receive suspension from the priesthood until he corrects himself and shows forth a virtuous and well-ordered life, such as is becoming to a priest. And if he do that which is forbidden to the priesthood, he shall be deposed from the priestly rank that same hour in which he does that which was above mentioned as forbidden. This we neither wish nor desire concerning him, but especially that he take care always to walk worthily, according to his calling, and to shepherd well the flock committed to him, that he may receive the recompense of a wise and faithful servant from the hand of Him that rewards each man according to his deeds; and that he not be found unworthy on the day of the Master's Dread Judgment, but that he might say: Lord, it is I and my children! That he may hear His sweet voice saying: Good servant, blessed and faithful, thou wast faithful in small things, I shall establish thee over many; enter into the joy of thy Lord.
Each and every priest is ordained to make Christ manifest and present in the local community. But each and every priest is also a human being with different talents, different strengths, different weaknesses, and different temperaments. What the priest must do is clear: he must make Christ alive and present in the lives of His faithful ones. How he does that is as varied as the number of parishes in the Church. Pray that God keeps all of His priests under His watchful eye, and, as St. Basil prays in his liturgy, "...let none of us who stand about Thy Holy Altar be put to confusion..."
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