FRIDAY FAIR - DO YOU REALLY THINK THAT JESUS WAS A BLUE EYED, BONDE HAIRED SCANDANAVIAN?

Someone wrote in recently (I lost the actual wire) that asked what the difference was between men and women being priests. You might find this an odd topic for Symbolic Friday but in actuality it is not. Part of the reason we have, in the Catholic Church, an all make priesthood is precisely because of the symbolic value. Now, this is not the complete reason why there is an all male priesthood (and I stress again the teaching is, in actuality, much larger) but this is an aspect of it.

We start from an understanding of the inner life of the Trinity. From the beginning God the Father gazes upon the His Son and gives all of Himself to the Son Who in turn receives this self gift of the Father and returns it the Father. The love between these two Persons of the Blessed Trinity is so strong and so palpable that it becomes a Third Person; the Holy Spirit.

We come as close as possible to living the inner life of the Trinity here on earth in the marriage covenant. This is stamped into the very creation of our bodies. The husband pledges his life and love to his wife. He does this also physically in that he gives of himself to her in the marriage bed. The wife receives this, mingles this giving with her own gift and returns it to her husband. The love between them is to be so strong and so palpable that with blessing of God, it is to be fruitful and becomes a third person; a child born into the world, a symbol of their love, the one flesh made up equally of both of them.

The number one symbol of Jesus’ care for His Church is that of bridegroom and bride. Jesus is the bridegroom and the Church is the bride. This relationship of love is to bear fruit (80, 90, and 100 fold) by the spread and growth of the kingdom. We hold that the priest, when performing the sacraments, is standing in persona Christi or in the person of Christ. It is not the priest who performs the sacrament, it is ultimately our One True Priest; Jesus Christ. To best symbolize this (keeping in mind this in only one part of larger teaching) a male person best symbolizes Christ. It has nothing to do with talent or ability or holiness but with symbolism. It is not exactly so much about Jesus' gender but what that gender symbolizes in the greater teaching. This does not make "maleness" better or worse, just this part of the equation.

Now, some people will bring up a couple of valid point to consider. The first might be that there are many other aspects to the human person that are ignored in favor of this one aspect. For example, Jesus was not European, was probably not as tall, or blue eyed, or any of the other attributes of which a person may take inventory. But we are not looking for a copy of Christ nor what would be considered incidental attributes but closer to that which is essential to the person. That I am bald or have a full head of hair is incidental to who I am as a man, but that I am male is much more essential to my being. Will we have hair in heaven when we are reunited with our glorified bodies? Who knows? But will there be gender in heaven? Though some would argue it there is much agreement that somehow this will play a factor.

Another point of consideration is that is it not our teaching that on some level we are all to be symbols of Christ in the world? Yes, that is also true. But that is considered in a much different fashion. The symbolic values change in this case. We are symbolizing a different aspect of “being Christ for others.”

This is a very simple answer to a very complicated question but I hope it invites you to explore it more deeply.