This is the beginning of the series where I will explore the magnificence of the Orthodox Priesthood and why the Priest is an Icon of Christ.
Treat myself to a short trip to my bathroom mirror and take a good look at myself. I do this everyday. And what I see depresses me. Don't get me wrong. I love the lines slowly showing on my face as signs of aging. I'm not afraid of them. I see these lines as wisdom marks etched on my face; because I believe that the more we age, the more we desire and gain wisdom...
What depresses me, then, are the marks of worldliness I see in my eyes and my whole being.
Realizing this weakness was never easy for me. I have had my strong bouts of denial and I shunned anyone who tried to help. I didn't shove God aside; I just didn't let Him near me-- anywhere near. But how could I resist His Grace? His Grace chased me. And finally I succumbed.
Sometimes I am thinking: what kept me from Him in the first place? I mean why did I avoid Him for so long? Have I really gone far away from Him; so far that I would never be able to come near Him again?
As I journey through the faith that leads to the Orthodox pathwalk, I slowly learn about why Christ's face is shown in every human being; but most especially why He is shown in the Holy Priesthood of The Church. See, before I saw the beauty of Orthodoxy (through the written works of Saints though, because I am yet to be baptised in The Church) I was taught by a man-made religion that the priesthood is no longer necessary because Christ Himself established and completed this priesthood. And since there's no longer priesthood, there was no need for traditions that requireth a priest anymore. This actually explains a lot the hate for even the term Father; the priest was reduced to a Brother or Pastor and the sanctity of God's truth was reduced to Sunday Worship or Bible Sharing or Sunday School. The music, although good, rock-and-roll-ey, and emotional, bore little or no resemblance to the correct way of expressing TRUE WORSHIP as prescribed in the Bible and in the early Church's Tradition). Even words like sacrament and tradition were alien to my ears and when thus they were spoken, they were spoken as taboo.
For a time I enjoyed all these. But then I became lukewarm; slowly I felt I didn't belong. I felt as though that church was no longer relevant and I, to that church. Evil crept inside me, subversive as ever, creating a spiritual vacuum within me.
It's God's saving grace that, just like what He did to Job, He limited the encroachment of the evil one, allowing me to believe in Him still. That's when I started searching for the Correct Glory. God was good.
And so I do believe now that I never lost faith IN GOD. I just lost faith IN THAT CHURCH that taught no priesthood, no prescribed traditions, no true worship, no Father... And then I thought 'If we no longer need the sacraments and traditions because Jesus fulfilled them all... then what are we doing HERE? What's the essence of all these Bible study, praise and worship? If I follow that logic to the T, and applied it: Jewish Law, in accordance to Faith in Jesus, is no longer valid because Christ Himself fulfilled it, thus, the new covenant. That's correct. SO (this is THEIR logic), we do not have to adhere to any priest or traditions (i.e Eucharist, and confession, repetitive prayers) anymore because Christ has fulfilled them already... Then what is it left with us to do then? Did Christ not taught His disciples to wash each other's feet? Didn't He say that the woman's story, who poured perfume on the Savior's feet, shall BE TOLD where the Gospel IS PREACHED? Didn't He told the young man to leave everything behind, carry his cross, and follow Him? Didn't He say, at the breaking of bread and drinking of wine, "you DO THIS IN REMEMBRANCE OF ME?"-- ALL of these ARE in the and in the Holy Bible and IN the Traditions of the Holy Church whom THEY so denounce because of Her strong emphasis on the Priesthood and Sacraments. Why not when Christ Himself TOLD it to BE SO?
As I continue my investigation in the Orthodox journey, I learn that the Priest, indeed, is the Icon of Christ. Because Christ set up His priesthood not as an end on the priesthood itself or for itself but for the continuation and succession of the faith that they received. Sacraments were given by Jesus Christ to those whom he commissioned to spread the Gospel, and He expected nothing less than laying their apostolic hands on those whom Jesus will send their way to continue the Holy Traditions.
Well I guess it's the lack of Icon of Christ in that church that made it repellant to me.
For without the Icon of Christ (the Priest), there would be no sacred mysteries, there would be no correct worship. Where there is no sacred mysteries and no correct worship there is also no living faith.
"Thus,... through the Mystery of Priesthood, the participant is united with Christ and through him with all those who like himself had partaken of Christ's priestly function at his passion. Thanks to them, i.e. to the new priests who will partake of Christ's priestly office to the end of time, his passion and sacrifice will be repeated anew in a mystical way “until he comes again” (1 Cor. 11,26). The Christian priest acts in Christ's stead and in his name offering the bread and the wine, i.e. those very elements which he himself blessed at his Last Supper and gave them to his disciples to eat and drink as his real flesh and blood. And it is Christ himself who is invisibly present each time the priest offers the bread and the wine in his name and stead who turns them into his own flesh and blood in a mystical way. The idea of representation is from the outset the fundamental factor that lies at the bottom of the Mystery of Priesthood."
TO BE CONTINUED...
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