The Vocation of Priest is an exalted one, and remains a great mystery

Fr. Edward Sousa Jr.

In his message of 12 Mar 2010, our Holy Father said "..."it is important clearly to bear in mind the theological specificity of ordained ministry, in order not to surrender to the temptation of reducing it to predominant cultural models. In the context of widespread secularization which progressively tends to exclude God from the public sphere and from shared social conscience, the priest often appears 'removed' from common sense." Yet, the Pope went on, "it is important to avoid a dangerous reductionism which, over the recent decades, has presented the priest almost as a 'social worker", with the risk of betraying the very Priesthood of Christ."

"It is particularly important that the call to participate in the one Priesthood of Christ in ordained ministry should flower from the charism of prophecy". There is great need for priests who speak of God to the world and who present to the world God; men not subject to ephemeral cultural fashions, but capable of authentically living the freedom that only the certainty of belonging to God can give. ...And the prophecy most necessary today is that of faithfulness" which "leads us to live our priesthood in complete adherence to Christ and the Church.

Priests, the Holy Father continued, "must be careful to distance themselves from predominant mentality which tends to associate the value of Ministry not with its being, but its function". Our "ontological association with God is the right framework in which to understand and reaffirm, also in our own time the value of celibacy........it is an expression of the gift of self to God and to others." "The vocation of priest is an exalted one, and remains a great mystery.....

The Holy Father concludes...."The men and women of our time ask us only to be priests to the full, nothing else. The lay faithful will be able to meet their human needs in many other people, but only in the priest will they find that Word of God which must always be on our lips, the Mercy of the Father abundantly and gratuitously distributed in the Sacrament of Penance, and the bread of new life"...http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JL_JoKuOXtI.