Why do we need priests?

Waiting on him said:

So when they become one flesh are they male or female?

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Giuliano said:

Yes, they still retain that bit of real tradition that goes back to the pre-Christian era; but then they "add" to it, saying it's not a valid marriage in their eyes without the priest being present to bless it.

Section 1210 is what really makes me scratch my head.

1210 Christ instituted the sacraments of the new law. There are seven: Baptism, Confirmation (or Chrismation), the Eucharist, Penance, the Anointing of the Sick, Holy Orders and Matrimony. The seven sacraments touch all the stages and all the important moments of Christian life:1 they give birth and increase, healing and mission to the Christian's life of faith. There is thus a certain resemblance between the stages of natural life and the stages of the spiritual life.

That is so odd since people didn't get married in churches for centuries and centuries of Christian history. I think the Council of Trent is when it was officially proclaimed a sacrament. Apparently the Catholic Church sees the marriages of non-Catholics as inferior to marriages conducted by priests inside churches. They don't believe people were married before Jesus instituted the sacrament of matrimony? They do, but somehow the "sacrament of matrimony" is superior to "ordinary marriage." If it is a sacrament that bestows grace in a way that ordinary marriage doesn't, why did it take so long to make it official if Jesus had instituted it centuries before?

Did Jesus tell Peter his marriage was inferior? Did Jesus bless the marriage of Peter and his wife to make it into matrimony?

I'm also left wondering how and when Jesus instituted holy orders. How the Catholic theologians can make things complicated.

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Giuliano said:

As if your saying so could make it so.

This is pure myth. The word in Hebrew is tsela' and it means side. This link will take you to Blue Bible which shows how the word is translated in the KJV. In Genesis, it was translated as rib; but that's not what it means. It may be what you were taught, but the Bible doesn't say that in the Hebrew.

Genesis 1:1 (KJV)

If Eve was "created" from Adam's rib, then she wasn't made in the "image and likeness of God." God is perfect. God is both male and female; and Eve was not inferior in any way, being made in the image and likeness of God.

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GodsGrace said:

They were both made in the image of God.
When a baby is born, HE will be made in the image of God because of the parents...

The question here, originally, was WHO was created first.
The answer is ADAM.
Eve could have never been created and stayed in his side .....
but God said it was not good for man to be alone...
so she was also created.

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GodsGrace said:

consecrated with holy oil

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GodsGrace said:

I never heard that before.
What are you getting at?

It means two people will mesh and work as one.
It's like taking two different things and making them into one that will work together.

A coat comes to mind.
It's wool on the outside and silk on the inside.
It has an outside part and an inside part.
But when the two materials are put together, they work well to function and keep the person warm.
The two become one.

If there's a theological answer,,,i've never heard it.

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Waiting on him said:

Only your husband can answer this, you can’t hear it from me

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Waiting on him said:

What makes the oil Holy?

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GodsGrace said:

Well good luck to me...
my husband is not even saved.

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Giuliano said:

I believe Genesis says Eve was made not created.

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How do you explain:

Genesis 1:27 So God created man in his own image, in the image of God created he him; male and female created he them.

Genesis 5:2 Male and female created he them; and blessed them, and called their name Adam, in the day when they were created.

There is a mystery in God as female. We read that God is Light; but we also read:

1 Kings 8:12 Then spake Solomon, The Lord said that he would dwell in the thick darkness.

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Pearl said:

As you say, in God exists both male and female. The way I see it is that God created/made Adam from the earth in His own image and then took out the female part and made/created a separate being. Together male and female, man and wife are complete, each providing for the other the missing element.

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GodsGrace said:

Depends which version you use. I'll use the YLT.

God made man. Genesis 1:26
God prepareth the man and woman. Genesis 1:27
God formed the man. Genesis 2:7
God made a helper. Genesis 2:18

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As you must surely know....the above is almost meaningless. Unless you know a reason why it is not. God CREATED everything...you can call it MADE, you can call it FORMED....
GOD CREATED...
Created is the correct word.

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God is spirit.
Spirit does not have a gender.
In God exists male and female....
He named them MAN in the day they were created...
We are MAN, just as God is Spirit.
Man encompasses both male and female.
Both have attributes that God has.

I'd like to hear any insight...I like the story of Adam and Eve.

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Pearl said:

As you say, in God exists both male and female. The way I see it is that God created/made Adam from the earth in His own image and then took out the female part and made/created a separate being.

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Together male and female, man and wife are complete, each providing for the other the missing element.

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Waiting on him said:

Your Husband is the savior of the body.

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Giuliano said:

I think so too. Remember God brings the animals to hadam who names them. None of them was suitable. We can love animals and they can love us; but a greater form of love is possible between two equal beings. I say male and female are equal, they only play different roles. Neither works that well by itself.

The Hebrew word for "earth" is interesting -- "Adamah" which is feminine.
I think so. They are not opposites but complements the way magnets have north and south poles. Men cannot be considered complete by themselves if all they have the male half. I think that's one reason it's good to have both a mother and a father; just growing up with both enables a child to absorb in part something of "the other." I know I credit my Mother for teaching me things I doubt I would have figured out as a boy by myself. I also think Timothy was a good church leader since he had a wonderful mother and grandmother.

2 Timothy 1:5 When I call to remembrance the unfeigned faith that is in thee, which dwelt first in thy grandmother Lois, and thy mother Eunice; and I am persuaded that in thee also.

And back to the subject of priests. I can see how being single would be an advantage for a missionary as Paul was. I can also see allowing single people to act as priests or ministers; but I think church leadership needs to be married. Something is apt to be missing if only single men are running things. There's talk now about whether the Catholic Church will allow married men to become priests. I hope so. I also think Paul meant a bishop should be married when he says "one wife."

1 Timothy 3:2 A bishop then must be blameless, the husband of one wife, vigilant, sober, of good behaviour, given to hospitality, apt to teach;

People look at that say it means he can't have two wives. Then they think having no wife might be okay -- but we need to keep reading.

3 Not given to wine, no striker, not greedy of filthy lucre; but patient, not a brawler, not covetous;
4 One that ruleth well his own house, having his children in subjection with all gravity;
5 (For if a man know not how to rule his own house, how shall he take care of the church of God? )

There is no doubt in my mind that having all single men as priests and bishops has hurt the Catholic Church. They are "missing something."

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Pearl said:

As you say, in God exists both male and female. The way I see it is that God created/made Adam from the earth in His own image and then took out the female part and made/created a separate being. Together male and female, man and wife are complete, each providing for the other the missing element.

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Giuliano said:

I tried to explain how any translation is difficult. Genesis 2:7 does not read "Adam" in the Hebrew. It reads "hadam."
Genesis draws a distinction. The creation was silent; and "create" is used only three times in Genesis 1: The initial creation which was silent, of souls and also when "the man" was said to be both made and created. I don't know why people refer to it as the "six days of creation." Maimonides' explanation is that all three involved the imagination. God as Creator used only His imagination to create; and we need to use our imaginations to know what "soul" and "image and likeness of God" are.

Isaiah also draws a distinction.

Isaiah 45:7 I form the light, and create darkness: I make peace, and create evil: I the Lord do all these things.

Light continues to be formed. . . . By his word too.
The word "Elohim" is actually "eloh" meaning goddess with the plural masculine ending "-im."

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GodsGrace said:

I don't think about this too much in the sense that YOU see it as MADE or CREATED.
When I taught our faith, I learned and taught that only God creates. So to me, the words used in Genesis are not too important and they all refer to God's creating.

The six days of creation just means when God created everything on earth.
What else could it mean?

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epostle said:

2 Samuel 11:8-11

Uriah understood the metaphor quite readily when King David sent him to his own house, to his own wife, with the words "wash your feet." What David intended for Uriah to do was to embrace his wife in the marital way, and thus to sire a child (or rather, in this case, to cover the fact that David had already sired a child with her).

Similarly, in the Song of Solomon we find the male lover pursuing his bride, coming to her at night to knock on her door. She responds by saying, "I had put off my garment, how could I put it on? I had bathed my feet, how could I soil them?" (Songs 5:3) Notice here not only the mention of footwashing as a prelude to marital love, but also the mention of laying down one's garment, just as Jesus did in the Upper Room.

It would appear that footwashing can be a metaphor for the marital embrace, which is to say, it is a ritual that is performed when one is preparing to reproduce —
preparing to become a father.

Also of interest is the Levitical instruction concerning the Day of Atonement sacrifice (which the epistle to the Hebrews takes for granted as the kind of sacrifice which Jesus offered on the Cross). In Leviticus 16:23-24

The High Priest was constrained by the Law to wash himself in water before making the atoning sacrifice, and it is interesting to note the order:

1. he takes off his garments,
2. performs the washing ritual,
3. puts the garments back on again,
4. then makes the sacrifice.

In St. John's narrative, Our Lord follows this exact order:

1. He takes off His garments (vs. 4),
2. performs the washing ritual (vv. 5-11),
3. puts the garments back on (v. 12),
4. and then goes on to endure His Passion.

It is odd that St. John would have included the details of Jesus taking off His garments and putting them back on again, if he did not have Leviticus 16 in the back of his mind.

There are only two differences between the Levitical ritual and the ritual performed in the Upper Room: in Levitical Law, the High Priest washed not only his feet, but his entire body, whereas in the Upper Room Jesus makes a point of only washing the disciples' feet; and in Levitical Law it was the High Priest who washed himself, whereas in the Upper Room Jesus does not wash Himself, but His disciples.

The first point of difference can be explained by an appeal to the elaboration of the laws in the Talmud, particularly in Tract Yomah, which is concerned precisely with the Day of Atonement rituals. There, the rabbis argued, as Jesus does in the Upper Room, that once the priest has taken his full bath, he need only be concerned with the cleanliness of his hands and feet.

The second point of difference comes closer to explaining the significance of the footwashing in John 13. It was the High Priest who was to wash Himself before the sacrifice; the fact that it is not Jesus who is washed, but rather His disciples, strongly encourages the interpretation that it is by having their feet washed that they come to share in the priesthood of Christ.

Finally, we may look again at Christ's words to St. Peter: "If I do not wash you, you have no part [meros] in me." (v. 8) This word used by Jesus is reminiscent of what St. Peter said to Simon Magus when the latter attempted to purchase the power of the Apostolic office: Acts 8:18-21

BOTTOM LINE: The moment Christ instituted the priesthood can be boiled down to His words,: Do this in commemoration of me

… declaring Himself constituted a priest for ever, according to the order of Melchisedech, He offered up to God the Father His own body and blood under the species of bread and wine; and, under the symbols of those same things, He delivered (His own body and blood) to be received by His apostles, whom He then constituted priests of the New Testament; and by those words, Do this in commemoration of me, He commanded them and their successors in the priesthood, to offer (them). source

Are we not then going against the teaching of the Church to suggest that the ordination of the disciples as priests took place during the footwashing ritual, as opposed to when Jesus commanded them to "do this" in memory of Him?
The Footwashing Ritual and the Sacrament of Holy Orders: A New Look at John 13

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