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Show WHY A PRIEST IS CALLED FATHER. Editor Intermountain 'Catholic: Will you please give the reason for styling your ministers by the appellation appella-tion "Father?" The Apostles were not so styled, I find no other creed applying apply-ing the word father to their ministers. Seeing that others have sent questions and were treated respectfully, I thought I would venture to ask. the above. A READER. "Father" applied to priests. Before the time of Christ teachers ' were called "fathers." i - 11. 1. St. Paul speaks of himself as "father" (1. Cor. iv., 15). 2. In early Christian ages spiritual teachers were commonly called "fathers," "fath-ers," especially those who presided over coenobites. The ordinary name was "abba" the Chaldaic form of the Hebrew He-brew "ab," meaning "father." 3. Later on all monks who were priests received the title of "father" as a distinction from the monks, non- I priests, called "brothers." HL 1. In more modern times in Prance, the higher class of candidates for ecclesiastical orders received the title "abbe" (the French form of abbas. 2. Then all clerics were called "abbe" and are so to this day, w hether in the greater or lesser orders. IV. In Italy priests are styled "abate" (the Italian form of the Latin j abbas.) V. 1. The word "tap" (Greek pappa. father), was used in the early church of all priests. (Wetzer u. Welte, "Kir-chen-Iexicon," s. f. Pfuffe). It is used by Theodore Balsamon twelfth century of the ' infe"rioV clergy who are not vet priests, and whom he calls panae pisinni (little papae, little fathers). From the ninth century onwards the word was extensively applied in Teutonic Teu-tonic and Scandinavian countries to ecclesiastics ec-clesiastics generally. In Germany the word became pfaffe. in the sense of "priest," though now held only in a contemptuous sense. In the same country priests belonging to a religious order are not commonly called vater (father), but by the Latin name, pater. VI. We thus see that from the earliest earli-est times in the Christian church it lias been customary to call priests "fathers." . The French abbe, the Italian Ital-ian abate, the German pfaffe, and the early and mediaeval papa, all testify to this custom. VII. Now, if we search to know what was the "style" of English priests in pre-Reformation times we find that they were addressed as "sir." Even Shakespere uses that title for priests, as Sir Hugh. Sir Oliver, Sir Topas, Sir Nathaniel. Fuller (Church History) sa vs: "Such priests as have the addition of "sir" before their Christian names were men not graduated in the university, being in orders but not in decrees." The Icelanders received Christianity in great measure from England, and throughout the Middle Ages in Iceland and Norway the ;'pellative "sira" was used of priests only. In Iceland at the present day it i3 recognized title of a priest (parson), and the Christian name only, so that a clergyman is never named without this title, just as in old English. (See Cleasby and Vigfusson's "Icelt. Diet." s. v., and Arnason's Islenzkar Thjod-sogur Thjod-sogur of Aefintyri," passim). I cannot here enter into the philology of the word, but hardly think it can be derived de-rived from the Latin "senior," through the French "seigneur," especially as we have "sire" in English, meaning-father meaning-father and confessedly akin to "sir." Should it turn out true that sir rcaflv does mean "father," then we have our old English Catholics calling priests by a word signifying father, just as their descendants are doing at the present dar. |