Aren't Priests supposed to remind us of Jesus Christ?

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123Strontium

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As the question states, aren’t they supposed to reminds us of the Son of God, only judging by some priests I know, they only remind me too much of all the weakness of human beings, big ego, self-importance. Do we see them as magicians of God, speaking sacred words in Latin like a spell, or are they they to remind us of Christ, through example?
 
Yes, and no.

Yes priests are supposed to be “in the person of Christ” in many ways. In particular they act in the person of Christ when they celebrate the sacraments. However, they are not required to particularly holy to have valid sacraments. Also, they are not supposed to act any more “Christ-like” than we are as laity in the sense that we are ALL called to holiness. So if the priests that you know do not seem to be holy, perhaps you can help them by leading a particularly exemplary life yourself and praying for them.
 
Well the apostles weren’t always perfect examples of Christ.

Peter denied Jesus three times.
Andrew and Peter were fisherman not carpenters.
James and John wanted to be seated at the right and left hand of Jesus.
Thomas doubted the resurrection.
Matthew was a tax collector.
Simon was a zealot.
And we all know about poor Judas.
 
Actually, we ALL should model Christ to others. But we’re all human, and that means we have human failings. Including priests.
 
All Christians should live our lives in “Imitation of Christ,” as Thomas à Kempis put it.
 
mikeeh said:
Well the apostles weren’t always perfect examples of Christ.

Peter denied Jesus three times.
Andrew and Peter were fisherman not carpenters.
James and John wanted to be seated at the right and left hand of Jesus.
Thomas doubted the resurrection.
Matthew was a tax collector.
Simon was a zealot.
And we all know about poor Judas.
Click to expand...
:tiphat:
 
Although the priest takes the place of our LORD in offering the Holy Sacrifice, he is no more going to resemble Him in personality that he normally would in body.

ICXC NIKA.
 
They are supposed to strive for and be holy, as otherwise they would be incapable of serving Christ & speaking for the Church, let alone leading the people or providing any sort of adequate spiritual direction. It would be a case of the blind leading the blind. Also the fact that they take up lives of poverty and obedience & celibacy indicates they are supposed to be closer to Christ than the rest of us who dont separate ourselves from the world as much. There was a statement somewhere that said ‘the most dangerous thing was a priest who didnt pray’. I guess there must be a few of those around, & they have actually proven to be pretty dangerous indeed! :eek:
 
robertkchacon said:
Yes, and no.

Yes priests are supposed to be “in the person of Christ” in many ways. In particular they act in the person of Christ when they celebrate the sacraments. However, they are not required to particularly holy to have valid sacraments. Also, they are not supposed to act any more “Christ-like” than we are as laity in the sense that we are ALL called to holiness. So if the priests that you know do not seem to be holy, perhaps you can help them by leading a particularly exemplary life yourself and praying for them.
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Priests are actually required, by the nature of their priesthood, to a higher degree of holiness and perfection than the laity given the graces they have received from their ordination and the fact that they can offer Mass. To whom much is given, much is expected. When a(name removed by moderator)riest goes to his judgment, he stands before God as a priest. If a person lost their soul through his negligence, he is culpable.

If our priests are not meeting our expectations, it’s because we haven’t prayer or done enough penance for them. The devil hates priests.
 
mikeeh said:
Well the apostles weren’t always perfect examples of Christ.

Peter denied Jesus three times.
Andrew and Peter were fisherman not carpenters.
James and John wanted to be seated at the right and left hand of Jesus.
Thomas doubted the resurrection.
Matthew was a tax collector.
Simon was a zealot.
And we all know about poor Judas.
Click to expand...
St. Matthew 20:20 mentions it was their mother and not the apostles… St. Mark 10:35 records it as the apostles asking. Any thoughts?
 
drew_neill said:
St. Matthew 20:20 mentions it was their mother and not the apostles… St. Mark 10:35 records it as the apostles asking. Any thoughts?
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Maybe Mark was trying to spare them the embarrassment. Two grown men needing their mother to ask their boss for a promotion. 😃
 
=123Strontium;11911137]As the question states, aren’t they supposed to reminds us of the Son of God, only judging by some priests I know, they only remind me too much of all the weakness of human beings, big ego, self-importance. Do we see them as magicians of God, speaking sacred words in Latin like a spell, or are they they to remind us of Christ, through example?
Click to expand...
cara.georgetown.edu/caraservices/requestedchurchstats.html

There are accorinding to this site

26,558 Dioscean Priest in USA
& 17,143 parishes.

Certainly NOT all of them are going tom meet everyones opinion of what a priest ought to be like. They are afterall, human too:) SO LETS PRAY FOR THEM ALL!

God Bless you,
Patrick
 
123Strontium said:
As the question states, aren’t they supposed to reminds us of the Son of God, only judging by some priests I know, they only remind me too much of all the weakness of human beings, big ego, self-importance. Do we see them as magicians of God, speaking sacred words in Latin like a spell, or are they they to remind us of Christ, through example?
Click to expand...
Ideally yes, they are supposed to imitate Christ by their example. That said, ordination doesn’t magically make a person holy. we are all imperfect creatures and all need the help of God - priests especially. I don’t think that people’s expectations of priests are wrong - it’s only fair to expect that a person who preaches the word of God and acts in the person of Christ will imitate him and live by the word. At the same time though, recognition of priests’ struggle is important too. In the words of a prayer by St Therese:

I pray for your faithful and fervent priests;
for your unfaithful and tepid priests;
for your priests laboring at home or abroad in distant mission fields.
for your tempted priests;
for your lonely and desolate priests;
For your young priests;
for your dying priests;
for the souls of your priests in Purgatory.
But above all, I recommend to you the priests dearest to me:
the priest who baptized me;
the priests who absolved me from my sins;
the priests at whose Masses I assisted and who gave me Your Body and Blood in Holy Communion;
the priests who taught and instructed me;
all the priests to whom I am indebted in any other way
O Jesus, keep them all close to your heart,
and bless them abundantly in time and in eternity. Amen
 
Surely priests are both symbol and “the thing itself”/men in persona Christi capitis.

Holy Orders is a sacrament. It is a sign. Symbols are also signs. There is a difficulty with using the term symbol to describe sacraments in modern discourse, but I think that is due to culture. When we hear symbol today, we think that it isn’t really what it seems to be. But I think a proper Catholic understanding of symbol is that the thing that does the representing is, to a larger or smaller degree, what it represents.

Of course a statue of a saint is not the saint, but I would say that it does contain something of the substance of it.

Is a picture just a picture? Is a representation or likeness just a likeness? No, I don’t think so. The universe is more integrated than that.

A priest is both a sign/symbol–think when a priest prostrates himself on Good Friday–and the thing itself–think when he offers the sacrifice by saying the words of consecration.
 
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