Go deeper, for parents

Two kinds of priesthood

Why every baptised person is a priest, and what the ordained priest does that no one else can.

What your child reads

By baptism we share in Christ’s priesthood, and in the Prayer of the Faithful we use it.

From The Prayer of the Faithful, The gifts are brought up, The Consecration

One priest: Christ

Christ is “high priest and unique mediator” (CCC 1546). At every Mass “it is he himself who presides invisibly” (CCC 1348). Teaching

The priesthood of all the baptised

Baptism makes the whole Church “a holy priesthood” (CCC 1546). We exercise it by offering our lives (CCC 901), and in the Prayer of the Faithful, where the people, “exercising the office of their baptismal priesthood, offer prayers to God for the salvation of all” (GIRM 69). Teaching

The ordained priesthood

Bishops and priests share Christ’s priesthood in another way. The two “participate, each in its own proper way, in the one priesthood of Christ”, and they “differ essentially”: the ministerial priesthood “is at the service of the common priesthood” (CCC 1547). “Only validly ordained priests can preside at the Eucharist and consecrate the bread and the wine” (CCC 1411). Teaching

In the person of Christ

At Mass the priest acts in persona Christi Capitis, in the person of Christ the Head (CCC 1548). That’s why, at the consecration, he says “This is my Body”, not “This is his body”. St John Chrysostom: “It is not man that causes the things offered to become the Body and Blood of Christ, but he who was crucified for us, Christ himself. The priest, in the role of Christ, pronounces these words, but their power and grace are God’s” (CCC 1375). Teaching

Priest, Prophet and King

All the baptised share in Christ’s three offices (CCC 783–786). This guide matches them to the parts of the Mass as a way to remember them. Tip

Questions children ask

So am I a priest?: Yes, in the way all the baptised are: you offer yourself with Jesus and pray for the world (CCC 1546; GIRM 69). But only a priest ordained in the sacrament of Holy Orders can lead the Mass and consecrate the bread and wine (CCC 1411, 1548).

Words to avoid

“The priest pretends to be Jesus” (he acts in Christ’s person, by the power of Holy Orders, CCC 1548); “the priest does it by himself” (it is Christ who acts, CCC 1375).