“PRIESTHOOD OF BELIEVERS”

Session II – “Fulfilling the Priesthood”

Bishop-elect Ariel P. Santos

In the Cathedral, we have started to do something different, very didactic, and more truthful.  When we baptize babies in this Cathedral, we dress them up with an alb and put a crown on their heads as they are ordained into royal priesthood.

The first time we did that, it was a baby girl that we baptized.  I whispered to the Archbishop, “Now, the CEC would be accused of having female priests.”  But we have always had female priests and married priests because each of us is a royal priest.  Our baptism is our ordination into that priesthood.

“Ordained” means to set in place. The Latin term ordo is the shape of the liturgy.  It is what is set in worship.  Order is when things are in place.  Many times, people see the clergy in their clerics and the automatic question is, “What order do you belong to?”   Each of us belongs to an order and it is called “Holy Orders.”

For the first time this year, we celebrated the Feast of Corpus Christi on the Second Sunday after Pentecost.  Providentially, it coincided with the Foundation Day of the Charismatic Episcopal Church.  On that day, we scheduled the installation of our ministry workers. This is very similar to a priest or deaconate ordination or a consecration of a bishop.  It is a recognition of one’s calling and gift.  They are set in place - ordained.  Each of us received the Holy Spirit at baptism for ministry.  Why else would we want the Holy Spirit?  We are no Simon Magus, in the Book of Acts, wanting to buy the anointing of the Spirit.  For Christians, the Holy Spirit is given for the fulfillment of our priestly ministry.  If we have received the Holy Spirit in baptism, we are a priest.

All of us are priests!  We are ontologically the same.  We have the same make up, composition, same spiritual DNA and genetic structure because the Holy Spirit is in us.   We have different roles and each as is important as the other.  Just like the Trinity, each of us has the same make up.

There is an illustration of the Trinity that is in Latin.  It shows in the middle a circle that says Deus or God with three branches pointing to Pater – Father, Filius – Son, and Spiritus Sanctus – Holy Spirit.  It illustrates that God is Father, God is Son, and God is Holy Spirit.  Father is God, Son is God, and Holy Spirit is God.