NEWS ANALYSIS/OMNIS TERRA - Priesthood in Pakistan: challenges to proclaim and live the Gospel

Lent and Easter Season a busy season for Catholic Priests in Pakistan. Presence of the Priest is highly demanded in all the programs, gathering and festivals besides the Eucharistic Celebration, the main service of the Priest. Priests have to say more than one Mass in a day also to fulfill the spiritual needs of the people during the Holy Season.
Looking at the challenges that Priests are facing in Pakistan, Fr. Ryan Joseph, Rector of St. Pius X Minor Seminary in Karachi, said: "The Lent Season gets very busy because our Priests have to make sure that they are present for all the Friday Masses as well as Sunday Masses till the Easter time. Priests are invited in the various programs and meetings organized in parishes, schools and Diocesan commissions.
We Priests in Karachi do our best to be available to bring joy to our people and to accompany them in meditating the mysteries of death and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ".
Archbishop Joseph Coutts of Karachi addressed these words to more than 1000 people among priests and consecrated on the occasion of the recent ordination of two new Priests in St. Patrick’s Cathedral in Karachi: "Priesthood is not a status, it is a sacrifice. We live to sacrifice, a sacrifice we inherited and obtained from our Lord and Master Jesus Christ. Being a follower of Jesus – Our high Priest, we have to sacrifice ourselves daily”.
This is the Theological perspective shared by the Archbishop: "In the Old Testament Priests sacrifice a lamb for the sins of the people, but in the New Testament we see Jesus himself as a Sacrificial Lamb.
He came to this world to be the sacrifice and He taught the same thing to his disciples. The message is the same for us Priests".
A Priest must not only serve but sacrifice too, because a Priest has the biggest responsibility to Celebrate the Eucharist, the biggest Sacrifice of every day in Mass, Archbishop Coutts added. (...)

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