The Gift Of The Priesthood

By Unknown -

 God reveals Himself to us in a multitude of ways each day. One of these moments came this past Sunday at a Mass of Thanksgiving celebrated by one of our parish priests who was celebrating his tenth anniversary as a priest.
It was one of those special Masses that made me happy and proud to be a Catholic. There were several moments during this Mass that stood out, but the one that remains with me is one that occurs anytime I attend a Mass that is concelebrated. Fr. Luke had not only our pastor and one other priest from our parish, but also two other brother priests from another parish concelebrating with him~seven priests total. Seeing them around the altar especially during the Consecration was a powerful sight. All I could think at this moment was:"There is the powerful line of defense against the powers of hell." Now I know it doesn't matter whether there is one priest or 20 celebrating a Mass, but as I said the visual was powerful.
About three years ago, I felt the call to become a spiritual mother to priests. I found an organization that will assign you a priest to pray for throughout the year. A new priest's name is sent to me each June. These priests are my spiritual sons. I know nothing about them other than their names, but that doesn't matter because God knows their needs.
I think one of the reasons I felt God, or perhaps Our Lady, calling me to this is because in our current age our priests are on the front lines of the spiritual warfare that is a part of this earthly life. No priests~no Jesus in the Eucharist. Satan knows this and does all he can to poke gaping holes in this line of defense.
Now more than ever, it is important to pray for our priests and encourage them in their vocations.
The priest I mentioned at the beginning of this post said during his homily that he is there for us, to serve us~ any time day or night. He lives those words, as many of our priests do.
The Church, the priesthood may  suffer scandal, persecution and God only knows what else, but Christ promised that the gates of hell would not prevail against His Church. God never goes back on His promises, but I think He would like our prayerful help in this area. So let's pray for our priests.
Our Lady,Queen of the Apostles, obtain for us many holy and faithful priests.

Comments

  1. joannaB735:54 pm, June 07, 2011

    Thank you for this post - we are very blessed with our priests at our parish at the moment.

    ReplyDelete

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