There are also important distinctions in the priesthood of all baptized Christians and those who are priests and bishops by virtue of sacramental ordination. The hierarchical priesthood is not simply “more of the same priesthood that the baptized have,” he added. “It’s not a super priesthood somehow completing, displacing or superseding the common priesthood.”
At the same time, there is a “priesthood which marks the whole Church as a priestly people.” This does not imply “that there is an ‘inner Church’ of ‘super Christians’ and that that is the hierarchy,” because that falls into the error of clericalism.
“if baptism confers a priesthood, it means it confers a participation in the sacrifice of Christ which, made present in the Eucharist, makes the Church,” Cavadini said.
“The exercise of this priesthood, then is ordered towards communion, and evangelization, if it is truly an exercise of the baptismal priesthood, is intended to bring people to the encounter with the Risen Lord, which is the incorporation into the eucharistic body, through configuration to Christ’s sacrifice.”
McGrath Center
