So, not being old enough to drive myself to church on Sunday, I stopped going as well. I told myself I would go back when I finally turned sixteen and had a car, but the habit of sleeping in on Sunday’s combined with working at my new job, kept me from keeping my promise. When I graduated highschool in 1998, I started dating a girl who was also an Episcopalian. I started going to church with her and her family. I would even go to her parish on the Sunday’s when her mother decided not to come and so she didn’t come as well. The next year I went to college and for the first semester, I didn’t go to church at all. I was a lazy freshman who thought that sleeping in on Sunday was a more important use of my time. Not to mention the exhaustion from staying up all night Saturday due to attending parties with my fellow Theatre majors.

At the beginning of my second semester of my freshman year, I decided that God was more important than my laziness and made a promise to Him to go to church every Sunday. As far as I can remember, I still have kept that promise. So I started attending the Episcopal University Center on Florida State’s campus. I was very active in their ministry as an acolyte and lector and with the various student activities that went on there. The Episcopal University Center (EUC) was a moderately liberal place at that time, as one would expect from a college ministry at a state university. The liturgy was a mix between low and high church. At the time, it didn’t seem to bother me. I was just happy to be at the EUC. It was a very friendly atmosphere (although there weren’t many students, but mostly adults) and was a place to get a free meal, which is very appealing to a young freshman trying to pay for college on his own.

At the end of my sophomore year, the priest at the EUC decided to take a job as the chaplain at the University of Toronto. After that we had an interim chaplain from St. John’s Episcopal Church down the road from the university, named Fr. Brad. Fr. Brad was a great priest who was very Anglo-Catholic. He totally transformed the EUC for the better. He introduced sacred hymns, regular use of incense, the sanctus bell, and even had a new pipe organ installed. He also instituted Compline on Wednesday nights. For the first time since I had been there, the EUC started to look alive again. Students started to come again and the place flourished. The EUC was the most Anglo-Catholic college ministry in the United States. The myth that orthodox and traditional liturgy and beliefs are not what the youth want was quickly dispelled By the grace of God, the Bishop of Florida appointed Fr. Brad as the permanent chaplain of the EUC.

My junior year, I was appointed President of the EUC’s College Council. I was a frequent acolyte and thurifer for the liturgy. While acolyting and watching Fr. Brad celebrate the mass, I felt myself thinking more and more of being a priest. But every time the thought came up, I quickly suppressed it. I was an actor, not a priest. I was going to be a famous movie star and live in Hollywood. So I continued pushing the thought of the priesthood out of my mind. Meanwhile I was growing more and more in my faith. I participated in all the newly instituted Bible studies we had (when they didn’t conflict with a play that I was in) and was proud to be an Episcopalian. I met my wife, Laura, that year at the EUC and we started dating the summer before my senior year. Laura wanted to be an Episcopalian priest, which I supported but didn’t really have a strong feeling in any direction towards woman priests. As a matter of fact, she was the first woman I had heard of wanting to be a priest. I had never seen a woman priest before. Once I found out that it was possible in the Episcopal Church for a woman to be a priest, I realized that they were particularly common.

I graduated from Florida State in 2003, and Laura still had a year and a half to go, so I continued being active at the EUC. When I graduated, she became the new President of the College Council. I began working at Starbucks and also was in a dinner theatre acting company. Laura and I began attending mass at St. John’s on Sunday mornings and then in the evenings we would go to the student mass at the EUC. Things went on normally for a while, in the bubble of the Episcopal life in Tallahassee, far away from the greater Episcopal Church of the United States of America (ECUSA).

Then in the summer of 2003, Gene Robinson was elected as the first openly gay bishop in the Diocese of New Hampshire. The entire Anglican Communion (of which ECUSA is a part) was thrown into turmoil. Parishes all over were divided on the issue. Many didn’t even know what was going on (I suspect many are still clueless). Still, the EUC was a safety haven for orthodox Anglicanism as well was St. John’s (which Fr. Brad also continued to serve as priest). I remember being proud that we got so many Catholics to leave the Church and come to the EUC. I didn’t have anything against Catholics. I recognized the Pope as the Vicar of Christ (however, I didn’t appreciate what that really meant) and held most of the same beliefs as the Catholic Church, due to my Anglo-Catholic convictions, but I was still happy to gain new converts. Looking back on it now, I realize to my shame that all the Catholics who left the Church for the EUC were liberal Catholics who came to the Episcopal Church because of its increasing liberalism and universalism.

For the next year, as the Anglican Communion (and ECUSA in particular) continued to deteriorate, I began to get frustrated in defending the orthodox position because I didn’t really know my faith too well. More importantly, I didn’t know why I believed what I believed. Thus, my search for the Truth began. In the Fall of 2004, I took part in a book study group that was reading God and the World by Joseph Cardinal Ratzinger, who was the Prefect for the Congregation of the Doctrine of the Faith in the Catholic Church. He immediately became my favorite theologian! I read half way through the book and enjoyed it immensely, but due to being promoted to Assistant Manager at Starbucks and writing a play for the dinner theatre troupe, I had no time to finish it.

Then the turning point of my entire life occurred on April 2, 2005; the death of Pope John Paul II. For some reason I was glued to the television. I had to see all the coverage. I knew that this was a really big deal, even though I wasn’t a Catholic and had no intention of becoming one. I read all the speculation about who the next pope would be. When I heard that Cardinal Ratzinger was on the list, I was ecstatic! My newly favorite theologian had a chance of becoming the Pope! I knew that a lot of liberal Catholics didn’t like John Paul II and wanted a change. They wanted a liberal pope to allow priest to be married, married couples (and non married) to be able to use contraception, and homosexuals to be “married.” I am amazed at how some people have no clue as to how the Holy Spirit works. I knew that the Catholic Church was guided by the Holy Spirit, yet deep inside I feared for what would become of the Catholic Church if it was infected with a liberal pope. If that happened, who would the Anglican Communion look to for its model of orthodoxy? I prayed constantly that Cardinal Ratzinger would be the Pope. I have come to a better understanding now, that the Holy Spirit will never lead the Catholic Church astray, for if that happened it would contradict Christ’s promise in the Bible that the gates of Hell shall never prevail against it.

So I watched the television constantly for the next seventeen days. Then on April 19, 2005, I watched live as white smoked poured out of the chimney of the Vatican. Newscasters everywhere were shouting, “Habemus Papem!” I watched intently as the announcement was made that the new pope was Joseph— At the sound of the first name my heart jumped inside me—- Ratzinger. Now, I was jumping! My favorite theologian was now Pope Benedict XVI. I started reading God and the World again from the beginning. I finished within a couple of days and I was on fire! Theology was my new interest. Next I read The Spirit of the Liturgy, Introduction to Christianity, God is Near Us: The Eucharist, the Heart of Life, and The End of Time?, all by Cardinal Ratzinger. Then I decided to learn more about the history of the Episcopal Church. I knew that the issue with Gene Robinson wasn’t the primary issue, but rather the tip of the iceberg. Below the waters was an increasing history of heresy and liberalism that was either dealt with by a smack on the wrist or else it was ignored completely. I read A History of the Episcopal Church by Robert Prichard and learned about the increasing liberalism from the 50′s onward with Bishop Pike in California, to the present day with Bishop Spong, the retired Bishop of California who denies the Resurrection of Christ, and even denies God Himself, yet is still in good standing with the Episcopal Church.

Next I read An Introduction to the Oxford Movement by Michael Chandler and found out that the liberalism that came to the fore in the Episcopal Church has long been preceded in the Church of England and combated by the Tracterians of Oxford at the lead of John Henry Newman. Newman became my hero. I wanted to root out the deep seated liberalism like Newman tried to. I wanted the Episcopal Church and the Anglican Communion to reclaim its Catholic heritage. At this point I began to entertain thoughts of the priesthood more and more. I wasn’t fully convinced that I should be a priest yet, so I kept my thoughts quiet. I did know, however, that if I became a priest I would start a new “Oxford Movement” in the Episcopal Church. Reading about the Oxford Movement was very exciting. It gave me great hope. Yet, that hope was somewhat diminished when I learned that John Henry Newman gave up the fight and decided to convert to the Catholic Church. I thought, “fine, he can go. I’ll just be like Keble and Pusey then, who stayed behind.” How naive I was! I continued to read more theology books and the hunger for the knowledge of God continued to grow.

Laura and I were married in January of 2005 and the debate within Anglicanism continued to rage on. I argued with many people about the prospect of leaving the Episcopal Church and aligning with an Anglican bishop from oversees. Meanwhile, the Diocese of Florida got a new bishop who was entirely motivated by power and did what ever he could to please the liberal majority of ECUSA. The diocese began to implode on itself. Parishes were split down the middle and even family members had opposing views. The new bishop could not control the whirlwind he created. Soon both sides of the debate were angry at him. By this time, Laura was looking for a place to go to seminary. The only two remaining orthodox seminaries left in the United States were Nashota House in Wisconsin and Trinity Episcopal School for Ministry in Ambridge, PA right outside of Pittsburgh. Nashota House isn’t partial to woman priests, so it was Pittsburgh we were headed. We moved in August of 2005 in hopes to settle in for a year and start seminary in the Fall of 2006. We were glad to be leaving the turmoil of the Diocese of Florida behind and find safety in the orthodox Anglican Communion Network Diocese of Pittsburgh. Shortly before we moved, a good friend of mine, Rob, was considering leaving the Episcopal Church for the Catholic Church, a move his parents had made not long before. I remember talking him out of it by telling him that as long as he is in Tallahassee in the bubble provided for by the orthodox priests there, he should remain Anglican. And if he moves somewhere else where the Diocese is liberal, then he should become Catholic. This is one of the stupidest advices I have ever given!

When we got to Pittsburgh, Laura and I visited Trinity Episcopal School for Ministry and I decided that I couldn’t stifle it any longer. I had to be a priest. I told Laura and she was a little weary at having two priests in the family. I told my priest and friend back in Tallahassee, Fr. Brad, about my decision and he was very pleased. About this time, though, he expressed doubts about his own calling to be a priest in the Anglican Church. These doubts had been troubling him for some years now.

After about a month of searching, Laura and I found our church home at Trinity Episcopal Cathedral in downtown Pittsburgh. We loved it there! It wasn’t long before we were involved in a Bible study and had a good group of friends. During this time, Laura began questioning her calling to the priesthood and the idea of woman priests in general. One day she told me that she didn’t think that woman priests were right and that she no longer wanted to be one. Instead, she was going to go to grad school and get a Masters in Social Work. I was proud of her for making this decision on her own and told her that I still felt really strongly about being a priest. I started reading the Church Fathers and immersing myself in Church history and theology. Meanwhile, Fr. Brad decided he had to leave the priesthood in the Anglican Communion and become Catholic. I had been in constant contact with him and we would often talk about the Anglican Communion and the prospect of converting to Catholicism. I encouraged him as best as I could to convert, although I decided to stay. I reasoned that staying would be easier as we had just made new friends and established ourselves in a church here in Pittsburgh. To leave all that after we had just gotten settled in and the idea of having to find a new church home and new church friends was scary. It was also uncomfortable. Yet, my conscience wouldn’t let me settle for this reasoning. I saw that the Anglican Communion lacked authority. The Archbishop of Canterbury was just a figure head with no real power. He couldn’t discipline the rouge American Church that spit in his face, even if he really wanted to (which is a question up for debate). In fact, the head of the Anglican Communion isn’t the Archbishop of Canterbury, but rather the Queen of England. Henry VIII, in breaking away from Rome, declared himself his own pope and ruler of the Church of England. Ever since, the monarchy of England has been the head of the Anglican Church. This is something for the people in the Anglican Church to think about who oppose woman’s ordination. They have had a woman as their head ever since Elizabeth I.

I realized that the Catholic Church was the Church that Christ established. The Fathers of the Church give clear evidence for this. As John Henry Newman has said, “To be a student of history, is to cease to be Protestant.” I would rather be uncomfortable in the Church that Christ established, than to be comfortable a church that broke away from that Church. So I told Laura that I had decided to become Catholic and I thought she should as well. Naturally she was hesitant. She said she didn’t want to remain Anglican, but she didn’t want to become Catholic. I asked her to give me one reason why we shouldn’t. Just one reason. She couldn’t. I ask her if it was because she was afraid? She said that it was. To which I replied that fear should not be the reason for not doing anything, especially if it means not joining the Church which Christ established and which continues in an unbroken line to today through the successors of Peter, the Vicar of Christ, and the bishops in communion with him.

She agreed and we decided to convert. This was at the end of 2005. I was supposed to enter seminary in the Fall of 2006. There was a brief moment of panic about what we would do now that our entire life plans had been changed. I no longer wanted to be an actor and I definitely didn’t want to work at Starbucks for the rest of my life. Laura had already decided not to get her Masters in Social Work, because she wanted to be a stay home mom and raise our future children. Then I thought that if I can’t be a priest, I will do what is natural for a layman who loves theology….I’ll get my Masters in Theology and later on get my PhD and become a professor. The only problem was that the only Catholic University in Pittsburgh that has a Masters in Theology is Duquesne University. A university known for its liberalism and rejection of the Church’s Magisterium. Yet, we didn’t want to move from Pittsburgh after we had just moved here, so I decided that I would go to Duquesne and I would fight my way through for orthodoxy as I had done in the Anglican Church.

Everyone, for the most part, took the news of our impending conversion quite well. I called up my friend, Rob, who I had earlier convinced to remain Anglican and told him to forget everything I had previously told him. The Catholic Church is the True Church and to stay Anglican with that knowledge would be an offense against Our Lord. He has just recently converted also (along with one of his sisters), some seven months after I did. Others, our friends from Tallahassee who were also at Trinity Episcopal School for Ministry, just stopped talking to us altogether. However, before contact was all together lost, a friend from the seminary told me about another alternative to Duquesne University. He said there was this little Catholic school a little ways out in Steubenville, Ohio called Franciscan University. He had heard some good things about it and said it was worth checking out. I said I’d look into it, but I really had no intention to. After all, I had never heard of the school, nor had I heard of Steubenville. Who knows how far away it was? I’ll just go to Duquesne.

Then my mother-in-law (who is a former Catholic) sent me a tape series of talks on the Book of Revelation by some guy name Scott Hahn. I had never heard of him before so I didn’t think much about it. But when I listened to the tapes, I was blown away. This stuff was incredible! Who is this guy? I looked at the back of the case that the tapes came in and saw that he taught at Franciscan University of Steubenville. The name sounded familiar….it was the one my friend had told me about. Then when I got home (I was listening to the tapes in my car), I went to my office to get the book that I had just read explaining the Catholic Faith (and clearing up all the misconceptions I had) called Catholic and Christian by Alan Schreck. He also was a professor at Franciscan University! In my amazement I said to God, “Alright, Lord you win. I’ll check out the school.” I found out that it was only about a 45 minute drive from Pittsburgh and started the application process. I was accepted and took my first classes this past Summer of 2006, only a couple of months after being received into the Catholic Church. It truly is a blessing to be Catholic and to attend Franciscan University. Not a day goes by when I don’t thank God for the wonderful path he has directed me on. Thinking back on my journey, I also remember starting to pray the rosary a little bit after I got married. I felt it was something that Anglicans should be doing and we should not reject Mary as Our Mother. I didn’t do it regularly, just off and on, but that was enough for the Blessed Virgin. She only needs the slightest openness to her and she takes full advantage of it in order to wrap you in her motherly embrace and present you to her Son, Our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. Mary Most Holy looks for any opportunity to act as our advocate and plead for our souls to her Son. All we have to do is show her the smallest bit of cooperation and she will do the rest. Our Lady doesn’t desire any glory of her own, rather she directs us at all times to Christ. Mary is like the New Rebekah, who covers us in the clothing of Christ, so that when God looks down upon us, He sees His beloved Son and not our sinful selves. My advice to anyone who is not sure about the Catholic Church is to be open to the Truth, search endlessly to find the Truth (for in order to deny the claims of the Catholic Church and to have a clear conscience you must be certain that they are false. You may be surprised at what you find), and give Our Lady a chance to act as Advocate and Queen for you to her Son the King of Kings. Amen.

      Yet, that is precisely what the author of Hebrews claims. Hebrews goes so far as to say that Christ is a priest “after the order of Melchizedek.” It even says that he was designated so by God Himself.² A thorough reader of the Gospels might object that nowhere does Christ ever refer to Himself as a priest, nor do the Gospel writers make such a claim. Even more so, God never designates Him a “priest after the order of Melchizedek.” Where then does the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews find the basis for his theology? Does he make it up? Does the Catholic Church base its doctrine of Christ’s priesthood on only one book of the Bible? Surely there has to be more to it, even if that one book is inspired. Moreover, who is Melchizedek and how did he get a priesthood?

     I intend to show that the Epistle to the Hebrews does not invent the theology of Christ’s priesthood, but rather the Gospel writers put forth the concept and Christ Himself also alludes to it. The author of Hebrews says explicitly what the Gospels say implicitly. To do this, I will first provide a brief history of the origins of the priesthood, touching on the priesthood of Melchizedek and the split into two subsequent priesthoods. Next, I will show how David reestablished the Melchizedekan royal priesthood which was central to the rule of his Kingdom and his worship in the Temple. From there, I will move into the Gospels and their portrayal of Christ as the fulfillment of the Davidic royal priest after the order of Melchizedek. Lastly, I will show how Christ’s royal priesthood provides the link between the Kingdom, Temple, and Church and its implications for our worship in the Mass.

     The priesthood is as old as the first man. God instituted the “original covenant of royal-priestly primogeniture” from the very beginning.³ He created the world in six days and on the seventh he rested. The Sabbath is set up by God as a holy day of rest. It is the climax of creation; God’s covenant with mankind. When we celebrate the liturgy, we celebrate this covenant that God has made with man. In fact, all of creation is oriented towards this divine liturgy of the divine covenant. That is why we work six days out of the seven. The whole week leads up to this one day, so that each week is a sort of new creation. With this in mind, it is no surprise that Adam, the first man, was a priest. His priesthood, however, is not the same as the kind we know now, nor was it like the priesthood of the Levites. Adam’s priesthood was a natural one. The actions that Adam was to do in the Garden of Eden, “keep” and “till”, are priestly actions also proscribed for the Levitical priests in their duties in the temple. Eden was a primordial temple.⁴ Scott Hahn explains that “the basis for the patriarchal religion was the natural family order, most especially the patriarchal authority handed down from father to son—ideally the firstborn—often in the form of ‘the blessing.’”⁵ He also points out that “at this point in salvation history, family and church are coextensive—houses are domestic sanctuaries, meals are sacrifices, hearths are altars—all because fathers and their (firstborn) sons are empowered as priests by nature.”⁶ The “domestic church” existed way before Christianity.

     So, in Genesis, we see the natural priesthood passed down from Adam to Seth⁷ down to the time of Noah. When God causes the flood starting the world over with Noah and his family, we see Noah performing the same priestly actions as Adam did in the garden.⁸ The natural priesthood goes on and Shem inherits his father’s blessing and so on. Then, we reach chapter 14 of Genesis and seemingly out of nowhere comes this mysterious “Melchizedek king of Salem [who brings] out bread and wine” and he is also “priest of God Most High.”⁹ This is the first instance in the Bible where a person is referred to as a priest. But he is not just any priest. He is a “priest of God Most High.” Melchizedek also blesses Abram. But who is this Melchizedek? Who made him a priest? More importantly, where did he get this blessing that he gives to Abram?! For, a person cannot give a blessing without first receiving one. The answers to these questions can be found in St. Ephrem the Syrian’s Commentary on Genesis: “Melchizedek is Shem¹⁰, who became a king due to his greatness; he was the head of fourteen nations. In addition, ‘he was a priest.’ He received this from Noah, his father, through the rights of succession.”¹¹ Shem/Melchizedek passes the blessing he received from Noah onto Abram who was promised to be blessed by God back in chapter 12 . The priesthood continues on this way up to the time of Moses and the Exodus.

     Before leaving Egypt, Israel’s firstborn sons, spared by the blood of the paschal lamb, are consecrated formally as priests at the Passover.¹² Israel is now truly “a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.”¹³ Unfortunately, this does not last long. The Israelites make for themselves a golden calf as their god, rejecting the One True God who brought them out of Egypt. On that day, Moses put forth a cry not unlike the Archangel Michael’s, “Who is on the Lord’s side?”¹⁴ Only the tribe of Levi respond. The Levites go forth and slaughter all their kinsmen who committed idolatry, some three thousand men. This loyalty on the part of the Levites earns themselves consecration as Israel’s official priests, with the high priests descending from Aaron. Israel from that day onward is no longer a kingdom of priests nor is it by any means a holy nation. Even the Levitical priesthood itself becomes corrupted. All this leads up to the establishment of the Kingdom of Israel and its first royal priest—King David.

      David’s role as a royal priest is a reestablishment of God’s original intention for the priesthood. David initiates once again the natural order of priests. A priesthood after the order of Melchizedek. Under David and his son, Solomon, two priestly orders coexists side by side. The Melchizedekan priesthood, exercised by David, is superior at this time to that of the Levitical, for David appoints and commands the Levite priests in the ministering of the ark. One of the important things to notice is that no one questions David’s priesthood. David is definitely not a Levite. He is from the tribe of Judah, fulfilling the prophecy of Jacob that a line of kings will spring up from Judah.¹⁵ Yet, David carries out priestly actions without any opposition. Not even from God! He truly is a priest. And not just by virtue of his kingship. For, King Saul performed priestly actions and because of it, lost his kingship.¹⁶ We see David acting in his priestly role when he recovers the ark and brings it back to Jerusalem. In 1 Chronicles 15:27 we read, “David was clothed with a robe of fine linen, as also were all the Levites…and David wore a linen ephod.” The robe of linen is a priestly garment and the ephod is worn by the high priest.¹⁷ The Chronicler specifically mentions David alone wearing the ephod to show that David is the high priest and he is well aware of it. In the next chapter, David offers burnt offerings and peace offerings, blesses the people “in the name of the Lord,” and distributes to them bread and wine. All of these are priestly actions. Moreover, David, in offering a blessing and distributing bread and wine, performs the same actions as the other royal priest from Jerusalem; Melchizedek! And as a true “priest of God Most High,” David desires to build a house for God; a Temple. God, however, has other plans:

“Moreover I declare to you that the LORD will build you a house. When your days are fulfilled to go to be with your fathers, I will raise up your offspring after you, one of your own sons, and I will establish his kingdom. He shall build a house for me, and I will establish his throne forever. I will be his father, and he shall be my son; I will not take my steadfast love from him, as I took it from him who was before you, but I will confirm him in my house and in my kingdom for ever and his throne shall be established forever.”¹⁸

The son of David, Solomon, becomes the son of the Lord who builds a house for God and partially fulfills this prophecy. It is important to note that God mentions that the son of David will be his son. This sonship of God has priestly connotations as Pablo Gadenz points out:

“After the development of the Israelite monarchy, the king is referred to as the first-born son. King Solomon, the son of David, functions as a priest at the dedication of the Temple. According to Ps. 110:4, he is a priest ‘after the order of Melchizedek’ not only because Jerusalem is identified with the Salem of Gen. 14 (cf. Ps. 76:2), but also because he has received the title of first-born son.”¹⁹

Yet, as I said earlier, Solomon only partially fulfills the prophecy of God. The Son who will build a house for God and Whom God will establish His throne forever is our “great high priest,” Jesus Christ!

     “Everything that the priesthood of the Old Covenant prefigured finds its fulfillment in Christ Jesus, the ‘one mediator between God and men.’”²⁰ In the Epistle to the Hebrews, the title of priest is the most frequently used title to described Christ and is the only Book of the Bible to ascribe the title to Him.²¹ However, it is not the only book to portray Christ as a priest! Priestly allusions of Christ are woven throughout the Gospel accounts. But why don’t the Gospels say explicitly that Christ is a priest? Jean Galot answers that if Christ “abstains from using the title of priest, the reason is that the priesthood he claims is not like the Jewish priesthood then in place.”²² For if Christ called Himself a priest, people would associate Him with this priesthood consisting of Pharisees and Sadducees. Jesus has no intentions of that. Rather he points out their corruption and calls them “hypocrites,” “a brood of vipers,” and so forth. The priesthood in place also “[looked] out for its own interest and glory and [heaped] heavy burdens on the ordinary faithful.”²³ More importantly, “those who are called high priests in the texts, and who command the highest degree of priestly power within the Jewish nation, reject the message of the gospel.”²⁴ Christ’s priesthood is the complete opposite. Our Lord came “not to be served but to serve.”²⁵ This is an essential element of the Christian priesthood.

     Christ also does not call Himself a priest because He is not a Levite. If He had done so, He would have been laughed at and even stoned! Only a Levite could be a priest. Andre Feuillet mentions, “It is a fact that in late Judaism there was widespread expectation of a priestly Messiah, a Messiah from the house of Levi to whom the kingly Messiah from the house of Judah would be subordinated, an ideal priest who would be quite different from the traditional priesthood in which men were so disappointed.”²⁶ Yet Christ, not of the house of Levi but of Judah, becomes both the priestly and kingly Messiah shattering all expectations. St. John Chrysostom explains, concerning the tribe of Judah, “First it was royal, and then it is become sacerdotal: so therefore also in regard to Christ: for King indeed He always was, but has become Priest from the time that He assumed the Flesh, that He offered the sacrifice.”²⁷ Gadenz says that Christ “abolishes the Levitical priesthood and restores—on a supernatural level— the priesthood of the first-born sons.”²⁸ This would leave only the priesthood after the order of Melchizedek. Gadenz notes that “Christ is a priest after the order of Melchizedek not only because of the foreshadowing of the Eucharist in the offering of bread and wine, but also because He is the first-born Son of God as Shem-Melchizedek is the first-born son of Noah.”²⁹ I think he makes a very important point about Christ’s priesthood deriving from His firstborn sonship. It is the basis for the natural priesthood, of which Melchizedek’s priesthood is from. Feuillet as well notes, “The priesthood of Jesus acquires its dignity, efficacy, and duration from the fact that he is the Son of God.”³⁰ But if it is true that Christ fulfills everything that the priesthood of the Old Covenant prefigured, as the Catechism of the Catholic Church suggests³¹, then the Levitical priesthood cannot be fully abolished. I would suggest rather, that Christ merges the two Old Covenant priesthoods into the ideal priesthood which He embodies. Elements of the natural priesthood naturally were carried into the Levitical priesthood. And certainly the Melchizedekan priesthood is the greater, hence the author of the Epistle to the Hebrews states:

“See how great he is! Abraham the patriarch gave him a tithe of the spoils. And those descendants of Levi who receive the priestly office have a commandment in the law to take tithes from the people, that is, from their brethren, though these also are descended from Abraham. But this man who has not their genealogy received tithes from Abraham and blessed him who had the promises. It is beyond dispute that the inferior is blessed by the superior. Here tithes are received by mortal men; there, by one of whom it is testified that he lives. One might even say that Levi himself, who receives tithes, paid tithes through Abraham, for he was still in the loins of his ancestor when Melchizedek met him.”

But, the Epistle to the Hebrews also compares what Christ accomplished with what the Levitical priesthood should have done, yet was incapable of doing. Hence St. John Chrysostom proclaims, “But if he who bears a type of Christ is so much better not merely than the priests, but even than the forefather himself of the priests, what should one say of the reality? Thou seest how superabundantly [the author of Hebrews] shows the superiority” of Christ’s own priesthood.³² Hebrews shows that Christ fulfilled both types of priesthoods, yet there is more fulfillment in the priesthood after the order of Melchizedek. Alexander Nairne tells us that:

“The author [of the Epistle to the Hebrews] has in his mind a priesthood which is universal, has been in the world from the beginning, and possesses an unbroken life of growth running up at last into the perfect achievement of our Lord Jesus Christ. In Genesis he found a record of a king-priest not Israel’s race, who was nevertheless recognized by the founder of Israel, and is entitled by the author of Genesis ‘Priest of God most high.’ He blessed Abraham, that is he stood on his Godward side; through him, on that day in the far-off beginnings of the world’s history, Abraham drew near to God. The author has also to shew that this ancient, abiding, universal priesthood has never been superseded by the Levitical, but has gone on side by side with it, and at last outstays the aged and worn-out Levitical institution. And ready for his purposes he found a Psalm in which a later king of Israel is hailed priest after the order of Melchizedek. The narrative in Genesis and the appeal to it in the later Psalm give him the illustration, the argument, above all the name he wants, and he describes this priesthood as Priesthood after the order of Melchizedek.”³³

This is for good reason too, since Christ is the actualization of the Davidic King, and David himself possessed the Melchizedekan priesthood.

     All of the Synoptic Gospels portray Christ as a priest for sure, but the one that does so the most is the Gospel of Luke. In fact, Luke refers to Christ’s priesthood so heavily throughout his Gospel that, since He was a companion of St. Paul, it seems to help support the traditional view of Pauline authorship for the Epistle to the Hebrews.³⁴ Gadenz notes that “Luke is unmistakably presenting Jesus in the narrative as a priest– a priest not in virtue of his being a Levite, but in virtue of his being a first-born son.”³⁵ Luke presents Jesus’ priestly role right from the beginning of his Gospel. In the Annunciation, the angel says that Christ “will be called the Son of the Most High” and also he “will be called holy, the Son of God.” These titles of Christ reference back to 1 Chronicles 17:13 as well as to Psalm 110. Christ is the Son of God, a priest after the order of Melchizedek, who is “a priest of God Most High.”

     Also, Peter Leithart tells us that the births of John and Jesus are presented in order to show the similarities between the two men. John the Baptist was a Levitical priest who declared that he is preparing the way for One greater than himself.³⁶ Luke is telling us that not only is Christ a priest, but he is of a priesthood greater than the Levitical priesthood. The Presentation of Jesus in the Temple also points us to Christ being set apart, or consecrated, for priesthood. When Christ is presented in the Temple, he isn’t bought back as the law proscribed for the firstborn sons, rather, like Samuel, he was dedicated to God. The two doves mentioned in Luke are not for Christ’s ransom (which would have been five shekels), but for the removal of uncleanness incurred by Mary in giving birth to Christ according to Jewish custom.³⁷

      The Baptism in the Jordan alludes to Christ’s priesthood as well. Leithart points out:

“[W]hy did Jesus accept a baptism ‘of repentance for the forgiveness of sins’? Theologians have often answered, correctly it seems, by stating that Jesus’ baptism identified Him with Israel as her sin-bearing Substitute; Jesus was baptized ‘when all the people were being baptized.’ This fits snugly with a priestly interpretation, for the High Priest was the Old Covenant sin-bearer.”³⁸

He also mentions that by his preaching and at the baptism, John, a priest of the order of Aaron and Zadok, pays homage to Jesus, as Levi did to Melchizedek.³⁹

     Another important key to recognizing the priesthood of Jesus Christ is the genealogy found in chapter three. “Genealogies were particularly important for priestly houses. To qualify for service, Israel’s priests had to prove descent from Aaron, and later from Zadok….Thus, the genealogy of the Pentateuch runs from Adam to Aaron, while Luke’s runs from the Melchizedekan priest, Jesus, back to Adam.”⁴⁰ Another clue found in the genealogy is the mention that “Jesus, when he began his ministry, was about thirty years of age.”⁴¹ This is precisely the age at which Levites would become priests.⁴²

     Andre Feuillet, in his book The Priesthood of Christ and His Ministers, gives a nice summary of the actions of Christ in Luke that are seen as priestly:

“the blessing of the little children, the exorcisms and expulsions of demons, and especially the forgiveness of sins whereby Christ reconciled men to God. The name ‘the Holy One of God’ (Mk. 1:24; cf. Jn 6:69), which is given Christ by a possessed person, is sometimes said to be a priestly title, since priests were said to be ‘consecrated to their God’ (Lv. 21:6; 2 Chr. 23:6; 35:3) and the high priests were said to wear on his turban a plate with the inscribed words: ‘Consecrated to Yahweh’ (Ex. 28:36). Jesus liked to apply to himself Psalm 110 in which the Messiah is a king and a priest according to the order of Melchizedek (Mk. 12:35-36; 14:62). In Luke 24:51 Jesus blesses his disciples as he leaves them and ascends to heaven; this solemn blessing seems to recall the blessing given either by the high priest (cf. Si. 50:22) or by Melchizedek, in whom the Letter to the Hebrews sees a prefiguration of Christ the priest.”⁴³

As you can see, Luke’s Gospel has Christ’s priesthood implied at every point of Jesus’ life.

     Jesus Christ also performs the office of priest at the institution of the Eucharist. A parallel can be seen here with Solomon, who after dedicating the Temple, held a feast. F.X. Durrwell tells us that “Our Lord had always pictured the Kingdom as a feast.”⁴⁴ And also that “All the mystery of the Kingdom is contained and expressed in the Eucharist.”⁴⁵ The offering of bread and wine also remind us of Melchizedek in Genesis, but it is also a reference to the suffering servant told of in Isaiah. Again, Feuillet provides important insight on the matter:

“Every time the New Testament speaks of Christ’s role by alluding to the self-offering of the Servant of Yahweh, it is implicitly presenting Jesus to us as the priest of the new covenant. The accounts of the institution of the Eucharist, in which Jesus refers to Isaiah 53 (he gives as food and drink his own body and blood that are offered for mankind in his passion), are usually considered to be an implicit testimony to his priestly status.”⁴⁶

Scholars have noted that the prophecy of Isaiah 53 begins with a penitential liturgy in which the Servant is both priest and victim!⁴⁷

      After looking at the Synoptic Gospels, we can turn to the Gospel of John to see images of Christ’s priesthood that are not found in the previous three (or at least not to the extent of the fourth Gospel). For instance, in John 10:36 Christ refers to Himself as being consecrated and sent into to the world by God. Feuillet points out that Jesus is speaking on the Feast of the Dedication, or Hanukkah. This feast commemorates the rededication of the altar desecrated by Antiochus Epiphanes and also recalled the consecrations of Solomon’s Temple and the tabernacle by Moses. Feuillet notes that F. M. Braun sees this as a clear self identification on the part of Christ as the new Temple of God. Feuillet however, following W. Thusing, thinks of it as Christ referring to Himself as both priest and victim and points out that in Exodus 28:36, 41, “consecrate” is short for “consecrate as priest.”⁴⁸ In my opinion, the two interpretations do not have to be separated. In fact, they must not be! Christ is telling the Pharisees that His body is the New Temple which will become the Church, wherein He will be both the High Priest and victim. Christ effects a new priesthood. With this new priesthood there is a change in the law. Sacrifices will no longer be in one localized Temple. They will take place in His body, the Church. All sacrifices from this point on will be through Him and will actually be Him! For there is no other sacrifice worthy for our sins. No other sacrifice accomplishes what it intends; the washing away of sins. Only Christ as the priest, offering Himself, can wash sins away. That is why in the Mass the priest presiding is not the one offering the sacrifice to God. A priest, at his consecration, becomes an alter Christus- another Christ. Through the priest, acting in persona Christi, Christ is made present to offer Himself up in the form of bread and wine which truly is the body, blood, soul, and divinity of Christ!

      The prayer that Christ prays in chapter 17 is also recognized by scholars as a key point in the Gospel where He reveals His priesthood. It does not matter that Jesus uses not the title “priest” in reference to Himself. The fact that Christ says in verse 19 that he consecrates Himself is a direct proclamation that He is a priest! John clearly sees Christ as a priest and portrays him as such. The place that he does the most in his Gospel is the account of Christ’s crucifixion. John tells us that Christ was handed over for crucifixion at the “sixth hour.” This is the exact hour that the Lamb was being ritually slaughtered in the Temple by the high priest for the Passover. John also tells us that Christ was wearing a tunic that “was without seam, woven from top to bottom.” The description of Christ’s clothes (a priestly garment) and the notation of the time that Christ was handed over for crucifixion are John’s way of alerting us that Christ is the high priest and also the victim! “According to Leviticus 16 the Jewish high priest sacrificed two victims for sin, then entered the holy of holies, and sprinkled the throne of mercy with the blood of the victims. This final action was the decisive one for the expiation of sins. The death of Christ on the cross corresponds to the immolation of the two victims by the high priest, and the ascension of Christ corresponds to the high priest’s entrance into the holy of holies as well as to the sprinkling of the throne of mercy with the blood of victims.”⁴⁹ In giving of Himself, Christ makes the perfect sacrifice. This perfect sacrifice can only be made by a perfect high priest. Reginald Garrigou-Lagrange, O.P. tells us that “Christ’s priesthood cannot be more perfect by reason of the union of the priest and the victim, and of the dignity of the latter.”⁵⁰ On the Cross, Jesus Christ performed “a supreme liturgy, in which the beautiful fruits of grace would be poured out upon the world and enter the hearts of the faithful through the channels of Baptism, the Holy Eucharist, and the other sacraments.”⁵¹

     The Epistle to the Hebrews not only is the place that Christ is most explicitly designated as a priest, it also “discusses the tabernacle or temple more than any other New Testament book, except perhaps for John’s Apocalypse, which gives prolonged descriptions of the heavenly temple. The author speaks more of the ‘tabernacle’ than the ‘temple’, but what he says of the former also applies to the latter.”⁵² This is important because embodied in Christ is both the Temple and the Kingdom. The Temple because of Christ’s priesthood and the Kingdom because of his kingship. “Part of Jesus’ doing what Adam should have done included establishing the new temple and extending it obediently.”⁵³ He does this in the Church, which is His Body. Edmund Clowney recognizes this when he asserts that “Christ is the meaning for which the temple existed.”⁵⁴ Durrwell gives a splendid explanation of the mystery:

“On Easter Day, Christ’s body became the temple of the new people, the place where they gathered together, their point of unity, the dwelling place of glory where the multitude would rest in adoration, contemplating the face of God, and hearing his word. There they would come to offer the sacrifice of praise and expiation, they would adore and beseech. In the past, the Jews used to pray in a stone temple in Jerusalem. But the hour has come when the true adorers adore in spirit and in truth, in the glorified Christ, the true temple of God’s holiness, and in the Spirit of God, the supreme truth and divine holiness, who filled Christ on Easter morning.”⁵⁵

If the Mass is “Heaven on Earth” because Christ the high priest is truly present, then when we worship Christ in the Mass, we are worshiping Him in His heavenly Temple here on Earth. Our Liturgy is Temple worship! Not like in the Old Testament Temple, but in the New Temple that is Christ’s body. For wherever Christ, the royal high priest, is truly present in the Sacraments, there dwells God’s name and God’s house. No longer is the House of God a localized place. Travel to Jerusalem is no longer required to worship our God. Due to Christ’s death and Resurrection, we are able to receive Christ as He has given Himself (truly his body, blood, soul, and priestly divinity) in the Sacraments. Wherever there are valid Sacraments, there is the Church, the New Temple, and there God dwells. Hence, it is important to evangelize to bring the Church (the New Temple) to the ends of the earth. Not only will we fulfill the Great Commission given us by Christ, but God’s Temple will truly be the entire world as described in Revelation 22. In order to do that we need priests, validly ordained after Christ in the order of Melchizedek. For without priests, there are no valid sacraments. “The Church will exist in her fulness only where the priesthood of Christ—through Christian worship—continues to be exercised.”⁵⁶ Charles Journet wrote that “Christian worship is the place of passage through which the double current of love mounts from earth up to heaven and from heaven down to earth.”⁵⁷ Christ is the head of this worship. He is the priest who “suffers, sheds His own blood, operates through His own will, but through His own will lost and found in the will of God; that is, He obeys and therefore governs natural law, and is not bound by artificial rules.”⁵⁸

      In this paper, I have shown that the Epistle to the Hebrews does not invent the theology of Christ’s priesthood. After carefully examining the two Old Covenant priesthoods of the natural/Melchizedekan and Levitical, and exploring how David assumes the office of royal priest even though he is from the tribe of Judah, I have shown that the Gospels testify as well to Christ’s priesthood. Lastly, I showed that Christ’s royal priesthood provides the link between the Kingdom, Temple, and Church and that the Mass which we celebrate today, is nothing less than temple worship in Christ’s own Body, the new temple of God. “One cult and one liturgy are at the heart of Christianity. The blood-soaked Cross remains forever planted at the center of the true religion.”⁵⁹ And all this thanks to Christ, our royal high priest!

Copyright Danny Garland Jr. 2006