LETTER
OF
THE HOLY FATHER
POPE
JOHN PAUL II
TO
PRIESTS
FOR
HOLY THURSDAY 1997
1. Iesu, Sacerdos in aeternum, miserere nobis!
Dear Priests, continuing the tradition of addressing
you on the day when you gather round your Bishop to commemorate with joy the
institution of the priesthood in the Church, I wish first of all to express
once more my gratitude to the Lord for the Jubilee celebrations which, on 1
and 10 November last, saw so many brother priests take part in my joy. I offer
to everyone my heartfelt thanks.
A
special thought goes to those priests who like me celebrated the fiftieth
anniversary of their ordination last year. Many of them did not hesitate,
despite their years and the distance, to come to Rome to celebrate their
Golden Jubilee with the Pope.
I
thank the Cardinal Vicar, his auxiliary Bishops, the priests and the faithful
of the Diocese of Rome, who showed in various ways their union with the
Successor of Peter, praising God for the gift of the priesthood. My gratitude
extends to the Cardinals, Archbishops, Bishops, priests, consecrated men and
women, and all the faithful of the Church for the gift of their closeness and
of their prayer, and for the Te Deum of thanksgiving which we all sang
together.
I
also wish to thank all those working in the Roman Curia for everything that
they did to make the Pope’s Golden Jubilee a means of helping people appreciate
better the great gift and mystery of priesthood. It is my constant prayer that
the Lord will continue to enkindle the spark of a priestly vocation in the
souls of many young men.
During
those days, I returned many times, in mind and heart, to the private chapel of
the Archbishop of Krakow, where on 1 November 1946 the unforgettable
Metropolitan of Krakow, Archbishop and later Cardinal Adam Stefan Sapieha,
imposed hands on me, transmitting to me the sacramental grace of the
priesthood. With great emotion I returned in spirit to the Cathedral at Wawel,
where I celebrated my first Holy Mass the day after my ordination. During those
days of the Jubilee, we all experienced in a special way the presence of
Christ the High Priest as we meditated on the words of the liturgy: “Behold the
high priest who in his day pleased God and was found righteous”. Ecce
Sacerdos magnus. These words find their fullest application in Christ
himself. He is the High Priest of the New and Eternal Covenant, the only
Priest, from whom all other priests draw the grace of vocation and ministry. I
rejoice in the fact that during the celebrations for the Jubilee of my ordination
the priesthood of Christ shone forth in its ineffable truth as gift and mystery
for the people of all times, and until the end of time.
Fifty
years after my priestly ordination, my thoughts turn every day, as always, to
the priests of my own age, both from Krakow and from other local Churches
throughout the world, who have not been able to reach this Jubilee. I pray that
Christ, the Eternal Priest, will grant that they inherit their eternal reward,
that he will welcome them into the glory of his Kingdom.
2. Iesu,
Sacerdos in aeternum, miserere nobis!
I
write you this letter, dear Brothers, during the first year of immediate
preparation for the Third Millennium: Tertio Millennio Adveniente. In
the Apostolic Letter which begins with these words, I indicated the
significance of passing from the Second to the Third Millennium after Christ’s
birth, and I directed that the three final years before the year 2000 should
be dedicated to the Holy Trinity. The first year, solemnly inaugurated on the
first Sunday of Advent, is centred on Christ. For it is he, the eternal Son of
God, made man and born of the Virgin Mary, who leads us to the Father. Next
year will be dedicated to the Holy Spirit, the Paraclete, promised by Christ to
the Apostles at the moment of his passing from this world to the Father.
Finally, the year 1999 will be dedicated to the Father, to whom the Son wishes
to lead us in the Holy Spirit, the Consoler.
Thus
we shall conclude the Second Millennium in a great song of praise to the Holy Trinity.
This journey will recall the trilogy of Encyclicals which, by God’s grace, I
was able to publish at the beginning of my Pontificate: Redemptor Hominis,
Dominum et Vivificantem and Dives in Misericordia. I exhort you,
dear Brothers, to meditate on these once again during these three years. In our
ministry, especially our liturgical ministry, we must always be aware that we
are on pilgrimage to the Father, guided by the Son in the Holy Spirit. It is
precisely to this awareness that we are called by the words with which we
conclude every prayer: “Through our Lord Jesus Christ, your Son, who lives and
reigns with you and the Holy Spirit, one God, for ever and ever. Amen”.
3. Iesu,
Sacerdos in aeternum, miserere nobis!
This invocation is taken from the Litany of our
Lord Jesus Christ, Priest and Victim, which was recited in the Seminary at
Krakow on the day before ordinations to the priesthood. I included them as an
appendix in my book Gift and Mystery, published on the occasion of my
priestly Jubilee. But I wish to highlight it in the present Letter, for I
think it brings out in a particularly rich and profound way the priesthood of
Christ and our link with that priesthood. The words of the Litany are based on
texts of Sacred Scripture, particularly the Letter to the Hebrews, but not
exclusively. When for example we pray: Iesu, Sacerdos in aeternum secundum
ordinem Melchisedech, our thoughts go back to the Old Testament, to Psalm
110. We all know what it means that Christ is a priest like Melchisedech. His
priesthood was expressed in the offering of his own body, “once for all” (Heb
10:10). He who offered himself as a bloody sacrifice on the Cross also
instituted its unbloody “memorial” for all times, under the species of bread
and wine. And under these species he entrusted his Sacrifice to the Church. In
this way the Church —and in the Church every priest — celebrates the one
Sacrifice of Christ.
I
remember vividly the impression made by the words of consecration when I
uttered them for the first time together with the Bishop who had just ordained
me. I repeated them the following day in the Holy Mass celebrated in the Crypt
of Saint Leonard. And so many times since then — it is hard to count them — I
have repeated these sacramental words in order to make Christ present, under
the species of bread and wine, in the saving act of his self-sacrifice on the
Cross.
Let
us once more contemplate together this sublime mystery. Jesus took the bread
and gave it to his disciples saying: “Take this, all of you, and eat: this is
my body”. And then he took the cup filled with wine, blessed it, gave it to his
disciples and said: “Take this, all of you, and drink: this is the cup of my
blood, the blood of the new and everlasting covenant. It will be shed for you and
for all, for the forgiveness of sins”. And he added: “Do this in memory of me
How
could these wondrous words not be at the very heart of every priestly life? Let
us repeat them every time as if it were the first! Let us take care that they
are never said out of habit. They express the fullest realization of our
priesthood.
4. Celebrating the Sacrifice of Christ, we are
constantly aware of the words which we read in the Letter to the Hebrews: “When
Christ appeared as a high priest of the good things that have come,... he
entered once for all into the Holy Place, taking not the blood of goats and
calves but his own blood, thus securing an eternal redemption. For if the
sprinkling of defiled persons with the blood of goats and with the ashes of a
heifer sanctifies for the purification of the flesh, how much more shall the
blood of Christ, who through the eternal Spirit offered himself without blemish
to God, purify your consciences from dead works to serve the living God?
Therefore he is the mediator of a new covenant” (9:11-15).
The
invocations of the Litany of Jesus Christ, Priest and Victim, in some way go
back to these words or to others from the same Letter:
Iesu,
Pontifex ex ho minibus assumpte,
...pro hominibus constitute,
Pontifex confessionis nostrae,
...amplioris prae Moysi gloriae,
Pontifex tabernaculi veri,
Pontifex futurorum bonorum,
...sancte., innocens et impollute,
Pontifex fidelis et misericors,
...Dei et animarum zelo succense,
Pontifex in aeternum perfecte,
Pontifex qui... caelos penetrasti...
As
we repeat these invocations, we see with the eyes of faith what is spoken of by
the Letter to the Hebrews. As a Priest eternally consecrated by the Father in
Spiritu Sancto et virtute, Jesus now “is seated at the right hand of the
Majesty on high” (Heb 1:3). And from there he intercedes for us as our
Mediator — semper vivens ad interpellandum pro nobis — in order to blaze
for us the path of a new, eternal life: Pont if ex qui nobis viam novam
initiasti. He loves us, and he shed his blood in order to wash away our
sins — Pontifex qui dilexisti nos et lavasti nos a peccatis in sanguine tuo.
He gave himself for us: tradidisti temetipsum Deo oblationem et
hostiam.
Christ
brings into the eternal Holy Place the self-sacrifice which is the price of our
redemption. The offering — the victim — is inseparable from the priest. The
Litany of Jesus Christ, Priest and Victim, recited in the Seminary, helped me
to understand all this better. I constantly return to this fundamental lesson.
5. Today is Holy Thursday. The whole Church
gathers in spirit in the Upper Room where the Apostles gathered with Christ for
the Last Supper. Let us re-read Christ’s words of farewell in the Gospel of
Saint John. Among the many treasures of this text, I would like to pause at the
following words spoken by Jesus to the Apostles: “Greater love has no man than
this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. You are my friends if you
do what I command you. No longer do I call you servants, for the servant does
not know what his master is doing; but I have called you friends, for all that
I have heard from my Father I have made known to you” (15:13-15).
“Friends”:
this is what Jesus calls the Apostles. This is what he also wishes to call us
who, thanks to the Sacrament of Holy Orders, share in his priesthood. Let us
listen to these words with great emotion and humility. They contain the truth.
First of all, the truth about friendship, but also a truth about ourselves who
share in the priesthood of Christ as ministers of the Eucharist. Could Jesus
have expressed to us his friendship any more eloquently than by enabling us, as
priests of the New Covenant, to act in his name, in persona Christi Capitis?
Precisely this takes place in all our priestly service, when we administer
the sacraments and especially when we celebrate the Eucharist. We repeat the
words that he spoke over the bread and wine and, through our ministry, the same
consecration that he brought about takes place. Can there be a fuller
expression of friendship than this? It goes to the very heart of our priestly
ministry.
Christ
says: “You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you that you should
go and bear fruit and that your fruit should abide” (Jn 15:16). At the
end of this Letter, I offer these words to you as a wish. On the day of the
institution of the sacrament of the priesthood let us make this our wish for
one another, dear Brothers: that we may go and bear fruit, like the Apostles,
and that our fruit may abide.
May
Mary, the Mother of Christ the Eternal High Priest, sustain us with her
constant protection along the path of our ministry, especially when the road
becomes difficult and the work weighs more heavily upon us. May the faithful
Virgin intercede with her Son, that we may never lack the courage to witness to
him in the various fields of our apostolate, working with him so that the world
may have life and have it in abundance (cf. Jn 10:10).
In
the name of Christ, with great affection, I bless you all.
From
the Vatican, on 16 March, the Fifth Sunday of Lent, in the year 1997, the nineteenth
of my Pontificate.
Joannes Paulus pp II
LIBRERIA EDITRICE VATICANA
VATICAN CITY