Signs of the Times  

   WHY DOES THE CHURCH ORDAIN PRIESTS?

    During this consecrated "Year of the Priest" declared by the Pope, let us further examine the scriptural and traditional reasons Jesus established the Priesthood.

    In Leviticus, Ch. 9, we read that God commands Moses, as part of the Old Covenant, to ordain a specialized, professional priesthood to offer sacrifices for the people.  Later as part of the New Covenant in [his] blood (Luke 22:20), Jesus Christ establishes a new ordained priesthood for the Church and gives its members the authority and power to offer the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass (see Luke 22:14-20).

    All Christians share in a common "holy priesthood" offering "spiritual sacrifices" (1Peter 2:5) such as prayer, almsgiving (see Heb. 13:15-16), and faith in Jesus (see Phil.2:17).  But the special mission that Christ gave his apostles, their successors, and the priests they were to ordain--which includes, among other functions, presiding at the Eucharist and administering the sacrament of Reconciliation--was not to be shared by all of his followers.  "For...all the parts [of Christ's body] do not have the same function" (Rom.12:4).

      The New Testament refers to three types of permanent ordained offices in the church: bishop (in Greek, "episkopos"), elder ("Presbyteros," from which we derive the English words, "presbyter" and "priest"), and deacon {"diakonos"}.