Nearly forty years ago I stumbled across a story that started me on a long and circuitous exploration of what priesthood is really about. I wasn’t ordained at the time but was just entering the process. I’d hoped Fr. Capon’s book An Offering of Uncles would give me a clue just what this priest stuff was about. After all the subtitle was The Priesthood of Adam and the Shape of the World. But well into the first chapter Capon shared a reflection that started a ball rolling and that ball refuses to stop. I’ll share this excerpt in the hopes that it may stimulate some priestly reflections in others. It’s a reflection on marsh reeds that grew around a small creek in Port Jefferson, Long Island:
“Marsh reeds, when full grown, vary from five to ten feet in height, and the tassels on the ends of the good ones are thicker than squirrels’ tails. The next time you walk past a bank of reeds, try something. Pick out the tallest one you can reach, and cut if off with your penknife as close to the ground as possible. Ostensibly, perhaps even to yourself, it will seem that you are cutting it down to carry home to your children. No one will take serious exception. But in the carrying of it, you will make a discovery. Keep a record of your reactions: It is impossible simply to carry a marsh reed. For how will you hold it? Level? Fine. But it is ten feet long, and plumed in the bargain. Are you seriously ready to march up the main street of town as a knight with lance lowered? Perhaps it would be less embarrassing to hold it vertically. Good. It rests gracefully in the crook of your arm. But now it is ten feet tall and makes you the bearer of a fantastic mace. What can you do to keep it from making a fool of you? To grasp it with one hand and use it in your walking only turns you from a king into an apostle; to try to make light of it by holding it upside down is to become a deacon carrying the inverted crozier at an archbishop’s requiem. Do you see what you have discovered? There is no way of bearing the thing home without becoming an august and sacred figure — without being yourself carried back to Adam, the first King and Priest. So much so that most men will never finish the experiment: the reed, if cut at all, will never reach home. Humankind cannot stand very much reality: the strongest doses of it are invariably dismissed as silliness. But silly is from selig, and selig is blessed. If you ever want to walk your native ground in the sceptered fulness of the majesty of Adam, I commend the marsh reed to you. Whatever embarrassment it may cause you will be an embrras des richesses.“
The Apprentice Priest 