I wanted to be a priest in elementary school. I thought the Church would change it’s teaching by the time I was old enough and that maybe I would be the first female priest. Keep reading, I’m not a heretic. I didn’t know that I didn’t know the beauty of the Church’s teaching about our personhood, the priesthood, and the Eucharist. When the priest says “this is my body, do this in remembrance of me” he does not mean nor say this is a symbol but rather “this is my body.” And as he makes this bold proclamation as an alter Christus, another Christ, the body he speaks of, like each of us, has a distinct gender. Christ came as a man and so it is most fitting that the priest in his maleness proclaims this reality so we don’t get tripped up on seeing one reality, a female, while being asked to believe another, the true presence of Christ’s fleshed and engender body, which we know was male. Now my desire to be a priest was not entirely misguided for by our baptism we have been anointed as priest, prophet, and king. But what exactly does that mean for a sometimes sassy, twenty-nine year old laywoman and for us collectively?
In the Old Testament, priests offered sacrifices for people. Christ as the ultimate priest paid the highest sacrifice when He laid down his life for his friends. “In His resurrection, [Christ] had a beautiful body: the cuts of the scourging and the crown of thorns are gone, all of them. His bruises from the beatings are healed and gone. But He wanted always to keep His wounds [in His hands, His feet and His side], for those wounds are precisely His prayer of intercession to the Father. [It is as if Jesus were saying,] ‘But ... look,’ ... this person is asking you this thing in My name, look.’ This is the novelty that Jesus announces to us. He tells us this new thing: to trust in His passion, to trust in His victory over death, to trust in His wounds. He is the priest and this is the sacrifice: his wounds - and this gives us confidence, gives us courage to pray” (see Pope Francis article below).
Today, we, the faithful, fulfill this mission of priest through intercessory prayer as it is a journey outside of oneself into the sacred wounds of Christ. As we pray on behalf of another person to God, we come to know the heart, His heart of mercy, of the Father. His wounds are the price His mercy paid. Pope Francis says the only way to enter into the priestly ministry is through the wounds of Christ. The only way. He doesn’t say this is a good option- it’s the only way.
As we intercede for one another we want to pray with the heart of the Father and in order to know His heart more intimately we must make room and invoke the Holy Spirit. “The Spirit helps us in our weakness. We do not know what we ought to pray for, but the Spirit himself intercedes for us through wordless groans. And he who searches our hearts knows the mind of the Spirit, because the Spirit intercedes for God’s people in accordance with the will of God.” (Romans 8:26-17). He is our counselor and our guide. We must beg for the Holy Spirit so that we can participate in His outpouring of love.
Let us approach the throne of grace with child like trust, believing in the wounds of Christ. Have you meditated on the wounds of Christ? Do you see His great, personal love for you in each of His wounds? What we find in the wounds of Christ is the Heart of the Father. Let us rest in His Most Sacred Heart and surrender ourselves to the Immaculate Heart of Mary as her heart rests most perfectly in His. It is there alone that we can proclaim: “Wounded, I will never cease to love” for it is “by His stripes we are healed” (Is. 53:5).
Verso l’alto,
Kathryn
I wanna know your heart
“And when they found the stone rolled away from the tomb, but when they went in they did not find the body.” Luke 24:2
We are an Easter people, that is how we roll (the song doesn’t say that but I like it ;))
What’s up Pope Francis? I’m liking you more each day. This guy is legit!
*most of the theology in here is taken from Br. Malachy’s awesome workshop on intercessory prayer and praying in the Spirit. I would have quoted where appropriate but it’s pretty much all stolen from him!
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