by Susan Brinkmann, OCDS
Staff Writer
While addressing members of the Congregation for the Clergy this morning, Pope Benedict XVI announced the Year of the Priest to run from June 19, 2009 to June, 2010.
The Pope was speaking about the need for priests to pursue spiritual perfection when he made the announcement. “In order to favour this tendency of priests towards spiritual perfection, upon which the effectiveness of their ministry principally depends, I have decided to call a special ‘Year for Priests’ which will run from 19 June 2009 to 19 June 2010.”
This year was chosen because it marks the150th anniversary of the death of the saintly ‘Cure of Ars’, Jean Marie Vianney, who the pope called “a true example of a pastor at the service of Christ’s flock.”
The Pope described the three dimensions to the priesthood, the ecclesial, communional and hierarchical, calling them “absolutely indispensable for any authentic mission, and this alone guarantees its spiritual effectiveness.”
The ecclesial mission of the priest is necessary “because no-one announces or brings themselves, … but brings Another, God Himself, to the world. God is the only wealth that, definitively, mankind wishes to find in a priest.”
The mission is “communional” because it takes place in a communal or social setting.
It is “hierarchical” and “doctrinal” because it “emphasise the importance of ecclesiastical discipline (a term related to that of ‘disciple’) and of doctrinal (not just theological, initial and permanent) formation.”
The Holy Father stressed the need to properly form candidates to the priesthood and encouraged priests, “especially the young generations, to a correct reading of the texts of Vatican Council II, interpreted in the light of all the Church’s doctrinal inheritance.”
Priests must be “present, identifiable and recognisable – for their judgement of faith, personal virtues and attire – in the fields of culture and of charity which have always been at the heart of the Church’s mission,” he said.
“The centrality of Christ leads to a correct valuation of priestly ministry, without which there would be no Eucharist, no mission, not even the Church.
“It is necessary then, to ensure that ‘new structures’ or pastoral organisations are not planned for a time in which it will be possible to ‘do without’ ordained ministry, on the basis of an erroneous interpretation of the promotion of the laity, because this would lay the foundations for a further dilution in priestly ministry, and any supposed ‘solutions’ would, in fact, dramatically coincide with the real causes of the problems currently affecting the ministry.”
© All Rights Reserved, Living His Life Abundantly/Women of Grace. http://www.womenofgrace.com
