The Sublime Dignity Of The Catholic Priest

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Of what sublime dignity is the office of the Christian priest who is thus privileged to act as the ambassador and the vice-regent of Christ on earth! He continues the essential ministry of Christ: he teaches the faithful with the authority of Christ, he pardons the penitent sinner with the power of Christ, he offers up again the same sacrifice of adoration and atonement which Christ offered on Calvary. No wonder that the name which spiritual writers are especially fond of applying to the priest is that of alter Christus. For the priest is and should be another Christ” (The Faith of Millions, 255-56). - Fr. John Anthony O'Brien

The Holy Ghost in the Mass forms us in prayer. The Holy Ghost in the Mass forms prayer in us. The Holy Ghost in the Mass forms us into a prayer to God.

As Catholics, our personal or individual prayer must be in harmony with the Sacred Liturgy wherein we encounter the Lord Jesus Who is Himself the One Who prays the Mass. We are joined to Christ's action through the priest ordained to act in persona Christi. The priest is alter christus, another Christ.

John Keble, a don of the Oxford Movement, said

§ 6. [...] the Eucharist is our Saviour coming with these unutterable mysteries of blessing, coming with His glorified Humanity, coming by a peculiar presence of His own divine Person, to impart Himself to each one of us separately, to impart Himself as truly and as entirely as if there were not in the world any but that one to receive Him. And this also, namely, the bringing home of God's gifts to the particular individual person, has ever been felt by that person, in proportion to his faith, as a thrilling call for the most unreserved surrender that he could make of himself, his whole spirit, soul, and body: i.e. of the most unreserved Worship.

Because the Eucharist is, indeed, the source and summit of the Christian life (Lumen Gentium 11), Ordinariate Catholics take very seriously the preparation and celebration of the Sacred Liturgy.

For Ordinariate Catholics, as with our Extraordinary Form brethren, when we speak about the Liturgy we use a vocabulary that affirms the supernatural meaning and authentic identity of the Mass. Thus, Ordinariate Catholics speak of Divine Worship. To refer to the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass as 'Divine Worship' is to acknowledge the sublime character of the Sacred Liturgy established by Jesus Christ, Lord and God, for our salvation. 

How are we to learn from and worship the Lord if we obscure His Face, the Mass, by cheapening the Mass with talk that obscures the sublime nature of the Sacrifice of the Mass, or by imposing haphazard or wayward antics that distract from encountering Him as He is?

Immersed in the Eucharistic Sacrifice, we anticipate the heavenly glory, the hope of the resurrection that all faithful souls desire to attain. Let us attend!

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