National Review Online has posted an interview with Fr. George Rutler, pastor of the Church of Our Savior in Manhattan and author of a new book, Cloud of Witnesses. In the interview, he is asked how his book - a collection of stories about people he has known and learned from in his ministry - is a celebration of the priesthood?
Fr. Rutler responded: "I do not know of any condition of man, any state of life, which gives such immediate access to so many people of all kinds, as does the Catholic priesthood. That is why the devil especially hates priests. The moment a priest is ordained, he may hear the confession of a king or a beggar, and whatever palace or hovel he enters he is “Father.” This is not romance, except of the divine kind: It was ordained by Christ the night before he died. So when I write about people, I celebrate the fact that they were able to look over my frail shoulders and see a much bigger Man behind me."
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