For Plato, "Morality decides politics"; for Machiavelli, "Politics have nothing to do with morality." In our day it is: "Politics decide morality." The split in the priesthood is only one of the fissures of society. The severance is not as simple as a split of the "old" priests or bishops and the "young" priests or bishops, because this makes age the standard of reference. Spirituality has nothing to do with chronology, for a priest is a "man for all seasons." Rather, the disjunction is between those who have the spirit of Christ and those who do not - and this is indifferent to age. Saint Paul could pertinently inquire today: "Surely, Christ is not divided among you?"
Has Christ been parcelled out? Was it Paul that was crucified for you? Were you baptised in the name of Paul? - 1Cor. 1:13 -
Christ was divided in Corinth. He is divided in the Western World. If the fission of the atom symbolizes the minuscule division of the material world, the split in the attitude to Christ is the major shock in the realm of spirit. How is Christ divided today, and how does it affect the priesthood? The disjunction or fission is that of His Priesthood and His Victimhood. In this divorce, it is the victimhood that has been almost entirely neglected. Once this has happened, then a spurious question arises: Since the world is the standard, how shall the priest be judged? By his opposition to secularism, or by his identification with it? What good are contemplatives?"
"Why waste time praying?" "Why is the Church so behind times?" Christ is never made the test in any of these questions. And what proves the sad result more than the way the word "priest" is used today? Seminarians say they are "studying for the priesthood." A seminary is called a place for the "training of priests." On ordination day, a seminarian becomes a priest. Some priests leave the priesthood. Synods discuss the priesthood. Mothers boast: "My son is a priest."
Has the common use of the word "priest" blinded us to the wider dimensions? Are we falling into the very trap the New Testament writers sought to avoid by refusing to use the Greek word hiereus to describe the ordained priest? This word was used to describe pagan priests - Acts 14:13 - Jewish priests - Matt. 8:14; 12:4-5; Luke 1:5 - The term hiereus was avoided in describing the priesthood of Christ, except in one instance, because the Jewish and the pagan priesthood offered worship something outside themselves. But Christ was not that kind of a priest, nor are those who are ordained as other-Christ, mere offerers of a gift distinct from themselves.
Christ was not just a priest. Who is Christ? This question must be answered first. Was He a Priest only or a Priest-Victim? This question was answered when He visited the half-pagan, half Jewish city of Caesarea Philippi. Many legends of the gods of Greece lingered about that city; in a cave nearby the great god Pan was reputed to be born. Herod the Great had caused to be erected there a white marble temple to the godhead of Caesar. There the history of Israel mingled with Caesar worship. Our Lord Jesus makes a test of His disciples. If they were to follow Him, they must know Who He is.
Three Views Of Christ
In questioning, three different answers are given:
Christ is Man
Christ is God
Christ is the Priest-Victim
He began by asking: "Who do men say the Son of Man is?" - Matt. 16:14 -
What is the Gallup Poll saying about Me? Have you read the sociological investigations and random sampling of public opinion? Their answer in modern language was: "Their answer in modern language was: "22.4% say you are John the Baptist; 38.4% say you are Elijah; 24.3% say Jeremiah and the other 14.9% are divided in classifying you as one of the prophets." Leave the decision of Who is Christ to democratic processes and there is nothing but contrary and contradictory answers. The Lord had for it nothing but the withering scorn of His silence.
After the appeal to the democratic process, He moved to the aristocratic. He appealed to His House of Lords, His Apostles, His Parliament, His Senate: "And you, who do you say I am?" There was no answer. First of all, no one had been appointed as their spokesman. What is more, they were not certain of His identity. Thomas was too sad and lugubrious to be concerned with theological questions. Andrew, the public relations man of the apostolic band, was silent for he spoke only when he was introducing someone to someone else, example, the boy with bread and fishes to Our Lord, his brother Simon to Our Lord, and the Greeks to Our Lord. John had one eye on Peter who seemed to be coming to the fore with his aggressive and impulsive questions. Matthew, the publican, who once sold out to the Romans, felt too tense to answer as he looked at Simon the Zealot who hated the Romans. James was quiet, always deferring to his brother John. Philip the economist had no logistic problem to solve about feeding five thousand, so the question was beyond his interests, and so on for the others.
Then one man steps forward, without the consent of the others, and gave the right answer: "You are the Messiah, the Son of the Living God." How did he know? Not from a study of apologetic or the motives of credibility. The light came neither from reason, nor education, but from heaven. Saving faith is a gift of God: "Then Jesus said: 'Simon, son of Jonah, you are favored indeed! You did not learn from mortal man; it was revealed to you by My Heavenly Father'" - Matt. 16:17 -
Up to this point, we have the Council of Chalcedon, the Hypostatic Union, the sublime Christian truth that Christ is God and Christ is Man, or better, the God-Man.
At this point our theology stops and often our spirituality. Why have theologians not continued reading what happened at Caesarea Philippi?
We know what man says of Christ
We know what heaven says of Christ
But why do we not ask:
What does Christ say of Himself?
Christ now goes on to say that He is the "Servant of God" or the Holy One Who came to die for the sins of men. "Jesus began to make it clear to His disciples that He had to go to Jerusalem, and there to suffer much from the elders, chief priests and doctors of the law; to be put to death and to be raised again." - Matt. 16:21 -
He was here referring to Isaiah 53:1-2 where the Servant would suffer for the sins of mankind. To all this, His contemporaries would be indifferent, but in the end, God would exalt His Servant. He was not a crude substitute for men, but a Servant Who bears what others ought to have borne. "He bore our sufferings... He was pierced for our transgressions... He was tortured for our iniquities... He bore our suffering... And by His scourging, we are healed... the Lord laid on Him the guilt of us all... He My Servant shall vindicate many, Himself bearing the penalty of their guilt... and was reckoned among transgressors, because He bore the sins of many and interceded for their transgressions.
At the moment of Our Lord's baptism, the voice from heaven uttered a quotation from the opening line of Suffering Servant poem:
Here is My Servant, Whom I uphold,
My chosen One in Whom I delight,
I have bestowed My Spirit upon Him,
And He will make justice shine on the nations. - Isaiah 42:1 -
The Gospel of John confirms this by relating Him to His vicarious suffering as a "Lamb led to slaughter."
Here is the answer as to how Our Lord differs from all the others priests - pagan and Jewish. All other priests offered a victim distinct from themselves; example, a goat, a lamb, a bullock, but Christ offered Himself as a victim. "He offered Himself without blemish to God, a spiritual and eternal sacrifice." - Heb. 9:14 - Everyone else who ever come into this world, came into it to live; He came into it to die. Hemlock juice interrupted the teaching of Socrates. But sacrificial death was the goal of His Life, the gold that He was seeking: "I have a baptism to undergo, and what constraint I am under until the ordeal is over?" - Luke 12:50 -
He is both Offerer and Offered; both Priest and Victim. This deep secret of the Suffering Servant He did not develop in His public utterances, but reserved it for His disciples and future priests. To them alone did He unveil Isaiah 53, and only to them does He interpret His death as vicarious dying for sinners.
As a Priest He was sinless: "Which of you can prove Me in the wrong?" - John 8:46 - "The angel answered: 'The Holy Spirit will come upon you, and the power of the Most High will overshadowed you; and for that reason the Holy Child to be born will be called Son of God." - Luke 1:35 - "I shall not talk much longer with you, for the prince of this world approaches. He has no rights over Me." - John 14:30 - "What do You want with us, Jesus of Nazareth? Have You come to destroy us? I know Who You are - the Holy One of God. - Mark 1:24 -
As a Victim He was identified with sinners: "God made Him one with the sinfulness of men, so that in Him we might be made one with the Goodness of God Himself." - 2Cor. 5:21 -
As a Priest, He was holy with the Holiness of God;
As a Victim, He was "made sin."
As a Priest He was "separated" from the world;
As a Victim He came into it to fight against the Devil, the Prince of the world.
On the Cross, He was upright as a Priest;
On the Cross, He was prostrate as a Victim.
As a Priest, He mediated with the Father;
As a Victim, He mediated for the sins of men.
Before Pilate, He spoke seven times as the Priest-Shepherd;
Before Pilate, He was silent seven times as the Victim-Lamb.
As a Priest He has vertical relations with heaven;
As a Victim He has horizontal relations with earth.
As a Priest He had dignity;
As a Victim He suffered indignity.
As a Priest: God is alive;
As a Victim: God is dead.
As a Priest He prays to the Father that the Cup pass:
As a Victim He drinks it to its dregs.
Saint Augustine of Hippo, in his Confessions, interprets it well: Ideo Victor Quia Victima. Therefore Victor because He is Victim. As the ministry of Christ approached its climax, He more and ,more insisted that the victory over principalities and powers had to come through His sacrifice and death.
Christ personally was sinless, but He voluntarily bore imputed guilt. If He were only a priest, He would have stopped short of the Cross and the Resurrection. As our representative, He was found guilty of blasphemy because we blasphemed; at the courts of Annas and Pilate, we sinners were on trail in the person of the Sinless Substitute. Though personally sinless, He was officially guilty.
He was made poor to atone for our covetousness;
He hungered because we ate the forbidden fruit;
He thirsty because we drank from foul cisterns.
He was not a private individual, but a covenanted Head of humanity.
The very sinlessness of His priesthood was the necessary basis of His work of sin-bearing. "Christ was innocent of sin, and yet for our sake God made Him one with the sinfulness of men, so that in Him we might be made one with the goodness of God Himself." - 2Cor. 5:21 -
He must be innocent to stand for the guilty. He must be holy to stand for the unholy, otherwise He would not be a Savior. It was the Just Who suffered for the unjust. "It is hard enough for the righteous to be saved; what then will become of the impious and sinful?" - 1Peter 3:18 -
He died in our place. His sinlessness instead of disqualifying Him for death by crucifixion, became the essential qualification of being a sin-bearer. He did not die just to win our love. Picture two men fishing calmly at a wharf. One of them suddenly jumps up, throws himself into water and as he drowns, shouts: "This is to prove how much I love you!" The action would be ridiculous. But if someone had really fallen in and was in danger of drowning, then there would be some meaning in the plunge. He was bearing our sins, enduring hell on our account. It is not always true that we are happy because we love. Sometimes, the more we love, the more we suffer. A mother suffers more than a delinquent daughter who has lost all sense of virtue. Because God loves. He suffers for us.
The amazing truth is: it was God they crucified. "God was in Christ, reconciling the world to Himself, no longer holding man's misdeeds against them." - 2Cor. 5:19 -
If in Christ, Priesthood and Victimhood are inseparable, should this not be so in "other-Christs"? Why have we considered ourselves only as offerers and not as offered, as preachers and not as redeemers? Is the flight of many priests from the altar to the world not an evidence of some inner discontent that the Church has been too isolated from the anxieties and poverty which sin has caused? Psychotics still insist on the cult, ministerial, church aspect of the priesthood: neurotics want to be related to the politic, economic and social world which Christ came to redeem. Neither are effective. The psychotics are too much concerned with their own people of God, and end up by talking like taxidermists, too unconcerned with the needs for the unredeemed world. The neurotics see that the world needs readjustment, but they too often leave Christ behind and end up by doing the same work as social do-good, for their service is often at the cost of a surrender to the vocation of the Holiness of God.
The priest is called to be the sin-bearer as Christ was. This does not mean that he must wear hair shirts. Penance does not require hair shirts today; our neighbors are "hair shirts." Victimhood means rather that we feel the guilt and sin of the world as if it were our own, and by constant union with Christ, seek to reconcile all mankind to Him. Love means identification with others - not only with the sheep in the sheepfold, but also those who are not in it. Many popular of Dietrich Bonhoeffer glorified his "worldly religion" without knowing that he defined it as identification with the priest-servanthood of Christ.
This what I mean by worldliness - taking one's life in stride, with all its duties and problems, its successes and failures, its experiences and helplessness. It is in such a life that we throw ourselves utterly into the arms of God and participate in His sufferings in the world and watch with Christ in Gethsemane... How can success make us arrogant or failure lead us astray, when we participate in the sufferings of God by living in the world.
If sin were finished, the priest need only be a priest; but if Calvary is continuing, then the Glorified Christ can still ask: "Why do you persecute Me?" - Acts 9:4 -
If God appears dead in our nuclear age, it is because Christians and arid people have isolated Christ from His Cross. Some bishop, priest and religious have love enough for the hungry, but not love enough to redeem from guilt. The bishop, priest, in order to relate himself better to the world, may preach a "social Christ" or a "political Christ" or a "revolutionary Christ" but such indifference to the crucifixion produces sermons that are "sounding brass and clinking cymbals." The intellectual and moral commitment of the priest to the Sermon on the Mount needs also the existential surrender to the prolongation of the Cross. Mother Teresa of Calcutta expressed this idea: "Serving the poor without the love of Christ crucified is social work."
Ours is the time of the great divorce of Christ and His Cross, which is another way of saying the divorce of priest and victim. Dirty words have generally four letters, but the one word polite society shrinks from most is a five letter word: CROSS. The new schizophrenia in religion may be called staurophobia or "Fear of the Cross." Christ has been torn apart from His Cross. Christ is on one side, the Cross is on another. Thus, we have a Cross-less Christ and a Christ-less Cross.
The Christ without the Cross cannot save, for He stands for effeminacy, permissiveness and Jesus the Superstar who uses music to solace defeat. The Cross without Christ cannot save, for it stands for Dachau, Auschwitz, concentration camps, the crushing of individuals like grapes to make the collective wine of the state.
The political, religious question of the future is: "Will Christ find the Cross before the Cross finds Christ?" Will the priesthood find the sin-bearing victimhood of the world finds the priesthood? This is the spiritual and the political problem of the world.
BY ARCHBISHOP FULTON J. SHEEN ( 1895 to 1979 )
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Sunday, May 24, 2009
I have through years of reading, pondering, reflecting and contemplating, the 3 things that last; FAITH . HOPE . LOVE and I would like to made available my sharing from the many thinkers, authors, scholars and theologians whose ideas and thoughts I have borrowed. God be with them always. Amen!
I STILL HAVE MANY THINGS TO SAY TO YOU BUT THEY WOULD BE TOO MUCH FOR YOU NOW. BUT WHEN THE SPIRIT OF TRUTH COMES, HE WILL LEAD YOU TO THE COMPLETE TRUTH, SINCE HE WILL NOT BE SPEAKING AS FROM HIMSELF, BUT WILL SAY ONLY WHAT HE HAS LEARNT; AND HE WILL TELL YOU OF THE THINGS TO COME.
HE WILL GLORIFY ME, SINCE ALL HE TELLS YOU WILL BE TAKEN FROM WHAT IS MINE. EVERYTHING THE FATHER HAS IS MINE; THAT IS WHY I SAID: ALL HE TELLS YOU WILL BE TAKEN FROM WHAT IS MINE. - JOHN 16:12-15 -
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