Faithful Priesthood

St Barnabas, Omaha, Nebraska, November 2017

‘St Barnabas shines out in the pages of the New Testament as an eminent example of that faithful priesthood which does according to that which is in the heart and mind of God. When, not unnaturally, the members of the Church he had come to persecute were afraid of Saul of Tarsus, it was Barnabas who had faith in the reality of his conversion and was prepared to trust his penitence. That which Ananias began in the life of his great convert, Barnabas helped to complete by his loving ministry to the one who became his great fellow apostle. The priesthood is for the uniting of souls to the Lover of souls. The priest only comes between the soul and God to make more short and clear to the soul her union with her Lord’.

Father Andrew SDC, 1869-1946

O Lord God Almighty, who didst endue thy holy Apostle Barnabas with singular gifts of the Holy Ghost: leave us not, we beseech thee, destitute of thy manifold gifts, nor yet of grace to use them always to thy honour and glory; through Jesus Christ thy Son our Lord, who liveth and reigneth with thee, in the unity of the Holy Ghost, ever one God, world without end. Amen. - Divine Worship: The Missal.