Our High Priest

A number of years ago, when I was still in seminary, I had the opportunity to spend about two weeks in the Holy Land, including about one week in Jerusalem. Among the highlights of the trip for me was a visit to the Western Wall, the holiest site in Judaism and a place that has always fascinated me. If you’re not familiar, the Western Wall (sometimes called the Wailing Wall) is made of stone, about four stories high, right in the middle of Jerusalem’s Old City. It is the only remaining visible part of the ancient Jewish Temple Mount of the first century, the rest of which was destroyed by the Romans in 70 AD.

Today, pious Jews visit the Western Wall out of respect and remembrance for all that the Temple symbolized. But for the Jews of Jesus’s age, the Temple was understood as God’s dwelling place here on earth. On high feast days, the Jewish people gathered there to worship the presence of God and each day the Temple priests offered sacrifices in penance for the people’s sins. When the Temple was destroyed, this ritual culture was destroyed along with it, and in many ways, the Jewish religion was changed forever. God’s presence was no longer something near, dwelling among them; instead it felt distant, far off. No longer could sacrifices be offered for sins, but only the private prayers of the people. Today, when Jews from around the world visit the Western Wall, they do so mostly to honor the memory of the past. They may recite quietly a psalm, or place a prayer or intercession on a slip of paper in a crack in the wall, but they are there to recall what once was and to pray for its return.

I mention all of this background because it is helpful to understand the second reading that we heard today. For the last several weeks, our second reading at Mass has come from the Letter to the Hebrews, and we will keep hearing from this letter for the next several weeks to come. The whole purpose of the Letter to the Hebrews – or as we would call them, the Jewish Christians – is to explain how Jesus Christ is the new High Priest, the one who by his Incarnation, Passion, Death, and Resurrection has forged a New Covenant between God and humanity. The author of this letter wants to help his readers to understand that God’s presence is not distant, far off, or unapproachable because of our sinfulness. Rather God still dwells among us, not in a Temple, but in the very person of Jesus Christ, he who is like us in all things but sin.

This week, we hear what may be the very heart of the Letter to the Hebrews. Jesus is our High Priest not because he has taken this honor upon himself, but because God chose him for this role. Why? Because unlike other human priests, Jesus was able to offer a perfect sacrifice for sin – his own sinless self, his very life in exchange for our lives. Because of this, God has glorified him, raising him to his right hand. Because our humanity is now with the Father, we share in the identity in the Son – through him, we have become God’s beloved sons and daughters.

That's the general gist of the Letter to the Hebrews, and hopefully, this is not new information to us – this reality is at the very heart of our Christian faith. But the Church reminds us of it in these weeks through the readings of the Letter to the Hebrews in order to gently encourage us in an area that we need encouragement. After all, don’t we often feel like God is distant, far off from our daily realities? Don’t we too often let our sins and shortcomings and limitations prevent us from approaching him? Don’t we unwittingly tend to adopt a mindset of believing God’s presence as something inscrutable or intangible? If you’re like me, the answer is undoubtedly, “Yes.” 

19th cent. Russian icon Christ our Great High Priest and King

It is important to understand that while we may feel this way at times, this is not how God wants us to feel, nor how he truly is. God is not distant from us but utterly near, utterly approachable. In the person of Jesus, God has taken a share in our humanity and has provided for us a remedy for our sinfulness. Because Jesus shares our humanity, we are in a sense present already before God; and because of that, we can call upon his presence at every moment – to heal us, to strengthen us, to remind us that God is not distant but truly near, dwelling among us in the person of his Son. Jesus, our High Priest, did not just save us long ago – he continues to save us even now, interceding always to his Father on our behalf and reaching out to restore our humanity with his own.

“What do you want me to do for you?” That’s the question that Jesus asks in love to Bartimaeus in the Gospel. In love, he asks it also today of us. Like Bartimaeus, we need to give him a concrete answer! Call to mind right now the area of your life where you feel the most broken: the sin that you feel you cannot be rid of; the situation or relationship that needs healing beyond your own powers; the mindset or tendency that draws you away from your identity as God’s beloved son or daughter. Whatever your fault, believe that it is also an opportunity, because it is your answer to Jesus’s question: “What do you want me to do for you?” Through the power of our High Priest, that area of weakness can become an encounter of salvation. How often God wants to give us precisely what we most need, but we fail to ask! Or if we do ask, and we don’t see an immediate a response, we grow discouraged, instead of waiting patiently and confidently to see how God will respond in a way better than we knew.

Friends, as important as it is, there is another site in Jerusalem even holier than the Western Wall. It is the Tomb of Christ – notable because it is empty, because Jesus, chosen from among us to restore us to God, is now risen and at his right hand interceding for us still. Each time we approach the sacred altar, as we will in a few moments, we receive upon our very tongues not only the Lord’s Holy Divinity but the fullness of his Sacred Humanity as well, which heals us of our weakness, restores us in his grace, and reminds us of our identity as God’s beloved sons and daughters. May our Eucharist this day help us to experience anew his Presence dwelling among us and fill us with joy at the “great things he has done for us,” and can do still.