Priest or Minister?

PRIEST OR MINISTER?

By the Reverend JGH Barry, DD (From 'The Religion of the Prayer Book')

In thinking about the Christian religion we should remember that what we really need to know is the facts. The point is not what kind of ministry we would choose if we were running things, but what kind of ministry Christ instituted in His Church. The story is told of a man who heard an old-fashioned Presbyterian minister preach on a Hell of literal fire and brimstone, and complained to the preacher that people would not stand for any such Hell.

The Kingdom of God is not a democracy. It is a Kingdom where God is both King and Law-maker. We may not like that, but that is how it is. The real question is, What kind of a ministry has God chosen for His Church?

From the start, as we learn in the Acts of the Apostles, Christ's followers tried to continue not only in the 'Apostles' doctrine,' but also in the 'Apostles' fellowship.' They submitted only to ministers who were in succession from the Apostles of Christ. 'Apostolic Succession' may sound forbidding, but the idea is simple. The Father sent His Son Jesus Christ into the world, and the Son sent His Apostles with His Divine authority. And He promised to be with them 'all the days, even to the end of the world.' The powers He gave them, such as to ordain ministers to celebrate the Eucharist or absolve from sin, were given to them by Christ Himself. They gave the same powers to their successors. Their successors were the Bishops, and the Presbyters or Priests, whom they laid their hands on when they gave the powers. No one dared to exercise those powers in the Church, unless he was ordained by a Bishop. This is the line of 'Apostolic Succession.'

NOT A LINE, BUT A NET

Apostolic Succession really is more like a net than a line. Each Bishop is consecrated by at least three other Bishops. Each loop in a net adjoins several other loops. If the Apostolic Succession was only a line of Bishops, and it could be proved that one Bishop in the line had never really been consecrated, the line would be broken. A net is different from a line. One imperfect loop in a net does not destroy the net. One counterfeit Bishop cannot weaken the authority of the whole succession of Bishops throughout the world. It is not hard to show historically that the Bishops of the Church of England and the Anglican Church in the Twentieth Century are in direct succession from the original Apostles, and the same is true in the Roman Church and the Greek Church and some others.

The episcopate and the priesthood get their authority from our Lord Himself through the Episcopal Succession. The authority to minister has come down from Christ through His Apostles to the clergy of every age. Protestants hold that their ministers get their authority from the congregation. According to their theory there is no need for a man to be ordained by the laying on of a Bishop's hands. It is enough if he is commissioned by the congregation.

THE WITNESS OF THE CENTURIES

If we study the Acts of the Apostles, we see that the laying on of the hands of Apostles is always insisted on. This was regarded as proof that the man had a mission from Christ himself. The early Christian Fathers, such as S. Clement of Rome, S. Ignatius of Antioch, and S. Irenaeus, testify to the continuance of this in the age immediately following. The early heretical sects, like the Montanists, the Novationists, the Donatists, and the Arians, never departed from the principle of Apostolic Succession and always had the three-fold apostolic ministry of Bishops, Priests, and Deacons. Until the Reformation the same idea of continuity was held everywhere. This shows there was powerful authority behind it.

WHAT THE PRAYER BOOK SAYS

The Book of Common Prayer holds fast to this historic ministry tracing back to Christ Himself. The Prayer Book provides for making, ordaining, and consecrating Deacons, Priests, and Bishops. These are the only kinds of ministers who are ordained to minister to our people. The Preface to the Ordinal states plainly our Church's conviction that these three orders of ministry date from the time of the Apostles (Prayer Book, p. 529).

Article XXIII (Prayer Book, p. 607) forbids any kind of minister to officiate in our churches who has not been properly ordained by lawful Bishops. When a priest is instituted in a parish, the following is the opening sentence in one of the prayers which the Bishop is authorized to use (Prayer Book, p. 572):

O Holy Jesus, who has purchased to thyself an universal Church, and has promised to be with the Ministers of Apostolic Succession to the end of the World.

The General Canons declare that no person may officiate in any of our congregations without sufficient evidence of his being duly ordained to minister in this Church, and they expressly provide for the admission to our ministry of ministers of other churches who have already been ordained by Bishops not in communion with this Church. These are Roman Catholics, Greek Catholics, Old Catholics, and other Catholics.

WHAT DIFFERENCE DOES IT MAKE?

Some people may be surprised that the Prayer Book is so definite on this subject. Perhaps the Church's attitude may appear to some to be bigoted or even arrogant. But it is simply a question of whether a man has been commissioned to represent Christ and His Church. And it is not a question of moral character or intellectual ability, or even of spiritual attainments. A minister who has not been episcopally ordained may be a good man morally, a wise and educated man and an eloquent preacher, well equipped in spiritual discernment. But he has not been given our Lord's authority to make the bread and wine the Body and Blood of Christ, to bless in His name, or to absolve a penitent sinner. The ministers of non-episcopal churches do not even claim these powers. All they claim is that they have been given by the Holy Spirit the power to preach, to be spiritual leaders and moral teachers, to baptize and to administer a rite which merely commemorates the death of our Saviour. We should not wish to deny that these powers have been given to them by the Holy Spirit. Their ministry is often blessed, and has led many to forsake sin and to become earnest followers of Jesus Christ.

A TRUE AMBASSADOR

Our Church has held to the historic, three-fold, Apostolic ministry because it has always been the ministry of the Holy Catholic Church. We wish to feel that we are connected with the unbroken channels of grace flowing from Christ Himself. Our government at Washington deals with foreign nations only through their accredited representatives. If a man came from London and tried to conduct official business with our President and proved that he was a better and wiser man than the British Ambassador, and more suited to voice the real sentiments of the British people, it does not require much imagination to see how that man would be received. The President deals only with the authorized representatives. We cling to the ministers of Apostolic Succession, because we want to be certain that our ministers are indeed authorized ambassadors of Christ.

This view as to what is essential for the continuity of the Christian ministry is the view that was held throughout Christendom for fifteen centuries after Christ. We may call it the Catholic view. There have been two famous attempts to destroy or pervert this view. In the Sixteenth Century the Calvinists and other Protestants abolished the Episcopate and taught that Christian ministers derive their authority from the congregation. Roman Catholicism in the Nineteenth Century taught that the Pope is the supreme ruler of the Church, and the source of all ministerial power and jurisdiction. Both of these theories are many centuries too late to be true.

The Preface to the ordinal, quoted above, shows that the ministry of the Apostolic Succession which our Church adheres to includes the order of priests, which the Protestant bodies generally have done away with.

OUR GREAT HIGH PRIEST

Whatever men may think about the necessity of having priests in the Church, there are probably few modern Christians who would refuse to believe in the Priesthood of our Lord. That He is our great High Priest is the clear teaching of the New Testament, and especially of the Epistle to the Hebrews. One could scarcely deny it without rejecting the authority of the New Testament.

The main section of the Epistle to the Hebrews, which has been called the Epistle of Priesthood, is concerned with setting forth the universal and sovereign High Priesthood of Christ, and the fulfilment of His priestly work. The idea is familiar in the New Testament that the Church, the mystical Body of Christ, the blessed company of all faithful people, is a priestly body. Christ is still carrying on His priestly work in Heaven and on earth through the Church, which is His body. Therefore all the faithful share in His priesthood. This is what is meant by the 'priesthood of the laity,' of which we hear so much in some quarters.
Like the human body, the Church, which is the Body of Christ, acts through special organs or members. The function of priesthood is the offering of the Eucharistic Sacrifice in the celebration of Holy Communion. It is the continual remembrance, through re-presentation, of the Sacrifice of the Cross. It is offered through the ministerial priesthood. Those who have been set apart through prayer and ordination to carry on the priestly functions of the whole priestly body, are naturally designated as priests.

WE ANGLICANS

Belief in the priesthood is what distinguishes the Catholic theory of the ministry from the Protestant theory. It is a general principle that wherever we find priests we are in a Catholic church, and wherever we do not find them we are in a non-Catholic church. For some reason Protestants in general dislike the idea of priesthood.

Thus we perceive the Catholic flavor of the Prayer Book. We find that the second of the ordination services (page 536 and following) is called 'The Form and Manner of Ordering Priests.' Elsewhere in the directions in the Prayer Book printed in italics (called 'rubrics'), and especially in the Order for Holy Communion, there are many directions that the priest shall do or say certain things. The term minister is also used in the Prayer Book, but always it is used only for such functions as may be performed by a deacon or a lay-reader as well as by a priest. It is also used as a general term in order to include the bishops and deacons as well as priests. According to the Prayer Book, the second order of the ministry are priests. So the Prayer Book places itself among the liturgies and service-books of the Catholic Church.