Triptych of Christ the Sovereign Priest

Description Triptych of Christ the Sovereign Priest

This religious triptych, which represents the Christ the Sovereign Priest, is quite appropriate a gift for a priestly ordination. The subject represented by this religious object, Christ in Priestly Clothes Carrying a Chalice and a Host, as if he were celebrating Holy Mass, may seem original, it is nonetheless of great theological significance. It illustrates obviously a point of Catholic teaching on the sacrifice of the Mass that St. John Paul II often recalled, namely, that the priest, during the Holy Mass acts "In persona Christi", that is to say : by the power received with the priesthood, it is the very person of Christ who pronounces the words of consecration through the celebrant. Here is what John Paul II wrote in the letter Dominicæ Coenæ (year 1980, n ° 8): "Christ Saviour configures them so much to him that when they utter the words of the consecration, they do not act at all in the name of a mandate of the community but in persona Christi, which means more than "in the name" or "in the place" of Christ ... because the celebrant, for a particular and sacramental reason, is quite the same as the "high priest of the eternal covenant", who is the author and chief agent of his own sacrifice, in which no one, in reality, can be substituted for him. "
The priest acts in the mass in persona Christi only when he pronounces the words of the consecration; in the other parts of the Mass he acts either in the name of the Church or in his own name. What distinguishes one or the other is the nature of the subject of the sentence: if we have a subject in the singular, the priest acts in his own name; if the subject is plural he acts in the name of the Church.
As panels were chosen two angels in adoration. This choice is judicious because the tradition of the Church teaches us that at the time of the sanctus, a multitude of angels come around the altar to give glory and to adore Christ the Savior until the consummation of the holy species.
The dominant golden color of this religious object adds a note of joy, solemnity, glory and magnificence perfectly in harmony with the mystery represented.