5th Sunday of Easter, A April 26, 2026
Fr. Alexander Albert St. Mary Magdalen, Abbeville
“Thank you for your priesthood!” No, really, I am grateful for it. Your priesthood, I mean. Normally, of course, someone says that to an ordained priest. I hear it all the time, probably once a week if not more, especially with Good Shepherd Sunday last week. Really, I appreciate that and I earnestly desire to live my priesthood in a way that gives others something to be grateful for.
For all that, however, it is crucial that you embrace your priesthood, that you know how grateful I am for it. For all our insistence following the pastors of the Church, we don’t want lay Catholics to forget their own authority, responsibility, and dignity. St. Peter, the first pope, says in the 2nd reading, “you are ‘a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people of his own, so that you may announce the praises’ of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light.”
You, yes you, are a “royal priesthood.” The Church speaks about two priesthoods: the common or royal priesthood and the ministerial priesthood. Everyone who is baptized is part of the common or royal priesthood. Ordained priests are part of the ministerial priesthood.
Now, for practical purposes, when we say “priest,” we usually mean the ministerial, ordained guys. That does not change the fact that you have a share in Jesus’ priesthood. Some people cynically accuse the Church of limiting the laity’s role to “pay, pray, and obey.” While they mean it as a criticism, we can use it as a decent springboard for understanding your priestly role in the Church.
How? Well, consider this: Jesus prays. Jesus pays the temple tax, the annual sacrifices, and through the ultimate price of offering his life. Above all, Jesus obeys his Father and even obeys the laws and leaders of the covenant. Because Jesus prays, pays, and obeys perfectly, he overcomes the infinite spiritual debt of sin. Because he loves perfectly through his prayer, sacrifice, and obedience, he opens the way to heaven for human beings. That’s what he means when he says, “I am going to prepare a place for you.” And he tells us we know the way to follow him to that place. Thomas asks “what way,” and Jesus tells us “I am the way.” In other words, follow him by being like him.
When we are baptized, we are made like Jesus. We are given supernatural power to pray, pay, and obey in a way that infinitely transcends human power. This is the foundational meaning of Jesus’ teaching that “whoever believes in me will do the works that I do.”
This post-Christian world of ours likes to tell us that doing the works Jesus does can be boiled down to “be nice” and “accept everybody.” They conveniently forget that Jesus straight up told some people “no, you can’t follow me until you sell everything you own… or leave your family behind forever,” or “no, you cannot follow me unless you eat my flesh and drink my blood.” The secular world and watered-down Christianity forget Jesus was so offensive to people that they begged the government to kill him… and kill him in the most cruel method of execution possible. St. Peter warns that Jesus is “A stone that will make people stumble, and a rock that will make them fall.” He means it when he criticizes people for “disobeying the word.”
When Jesus says, “whoever believes in me will do the works that I do,” he definitely doesn’t mean you can just say, “I believe,” and call yourself saved. He means you’ve got to do things, that your faith takes work. And if you do not “do the works” that Jesus does, then you don’t actually believe. So what are the works of Jesus? Love, of course, but that word is too ambiguous, so let’s be more specific.
There are three categories of Jesus’ loving works: priestly, prophetic, and kingly. We’ll focus on the priestly today and pick up the others over the next two weeks. For the priestly role, let’s continue to reinterpret that cynical description of “pray, pay, and obey.”
For starters, by commanding you to pray, we are not oppressing you, but empowering you… St. Peter in this second reading is telling you that the whole reason you are called “out of darkness” – out of a life of sin and ignorance – is so that you can come “into his wonderful light” to “announce the praises” of God and “to be a holy priesthood to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.” In other words, the reason for salvation is so that you can pray, so that you can use God’s power for good.
Prayer is not just kneeling down to ask for stuff like we’re writing a letter to Santa Clause. It is a priestly act. Petitionary prayer – asking for stuff for yourself or others – is a way in which we exercise God’s authority to bring about good things in the world. As we grow in faith and love, our prayer requests align more with God’s will. God wants to do good things so he inspires us to ask for them so that, when he gives the world those good things, we can share in the credit for it.
Prayer is also praise, meditation, and contemplation. By the gift of baptism and the practice of faith, we not only talk at God, but with him. We are elevated to divine friendship where our prayer becomes intimacy and communion, not just words flung into the void. This is what St. Peter means in calling all baptized people “living stones” that are “built into a spiritual house,” a place where God dwells.
As for “paying,” there is a very real spiritual dimension to offering up material goods to provide for the Church and for the poor. Priests offer sacrifice – that’s the defining feature of a priest. By sacrificing your time, attention, and resources to be at Mass and to support the work of the Church, you are acting in a priestly role. So, I mean it when I say, “thank you for your priesthood” because, without your priesthood of the baptized, I could not practice my ministerial priesthood.
Beyond material things, your participation in Mass matters. It’s why I say “my sacrifice and yours” at the offertory. Everyone here knows that going to Mass in an empty church feels different than going to Mass when the Church is full. More people means more sacrifices which means more grace. Y’all aren’t spectators of me offering the Mass as a priest, you are real contributors. My ministerial offering and your baptismal offering are different, but both are genuine priestly sacrifices. we want you at Mass, even if you don’t give money, because there is a spiritual sacrifice that only you can offer. When you’re not here, the entire universe misses out on a spiritual gift that only you can give.
That unique contribution to the worship of God ties directly into obedience. Indeed, obedience is how you know you’re worshipping God and not yourself or your preferences. When God or his representatives say “this is how you worship,” it isn’t about control or preference, it is about integrity. Priests offer sacrifice, it’s what makes the priest a priest. Scripture even says Jesus learned “obedience from what he suffered.” His crucifixion, made present at Mass, is sacred because he did it out of obedience. It is our obedience that keeps it sacred.
That goes beyond liturgy, of course. By obeying God’s commands in our daily lives, we are sacrificing our selfishness and making our whole lives into a “spiritual sacrifice acceptable to God through Jesus Christ.” Never obey someone if it directly and clearly contradicts your conscience, but don’t let the modern idea of “freedom” blind you to the sacred power of holy obedience. Don’t let “keeping your options open” prevent you from becoming the royal priest you are meant to be.
Thank you for your priesthood, your common priesthood of the baptized. Don’t let the sneering world tell you that you’re missing out when you “pray, pay, and obey.” Meet their mockery by praying with God’s own power, by “paying” not out of compulsion, but as a sacrifice of love, and by obeying God rather than man… obeying the one who is the way, the truth, and the life so that you can do the works he has done. Indeed, done with faith, hope, and love, you may find yourself doing even greater works than these.