[Mad Dawg]

I think the distinction, as AG alluded to in her post, is that she in no way claims to be in any sort of elite "class" of Christians. We all receive spiritual gifts, but AG is NOT saying that her gifts are given to her BECAUSE of class. I think this is different than with the Apostolic clergy/hierarchy. For example, if faith and righteousness were measurable on a scale imagine there were two men with exactly the same number. One was a priest and one was a layman. The Church would see the priest as having exclusive rights to supernatural powers based solely on his class within Christianity.

This is very interesting. The "class" is the the group of those who have certain spiritual gifts. It's not that they have the gifts because they are in a class. (back to "not only bald, but has very little hair".) What ordination is is the bestowal by God of certain lifted spiritual gifts.

The Church would see the priest as having exclusive rights to (a limited and described set of) supernatural powers (not necessarily including faith and righeousness, in which laity have often exceeded the ordained clergy, to no one's surprise, I might add) based solely on his class within Christianity.

Those gifts would have more to do with the ordering of the "body" and would tend to be more regulatory. Further, the Church sometimes attempts, not with notable success, to respond to the evidence of certain spiritual gifts by admitting the one on whom they are bestowed to holy orders, in an effort to combine the gifts having to do with priestly or episcopal office with the other gifts you noted.

Don't forget Catherine of Siena: "Just" a woman, "just" a layperson, and yet she's yanking the chain of the Pope. I can't even remember the name of the Pope whose chain she yanked, but I remember her.

(Darn, I feel I didn't make my point too well here ...)

[hosepipe]

[ (Darn, I feel I didn't make my point too well here ...) ]

Yes you did.. The Pope is just a man.. needing the Holy Spirit just like us all.. and can be WRONG... God bless the Pope.. if he(God) has a mind to.. While I'm at it, God bless ME...

[Forest Keeper]

This is very interesting. The "class" is the the group of those who have certain spiritual gifts. It's not that they have the gifts because they are in a class. (back to "not only bald, but has very little hair".) What ordination is is the bestowal by God of certain lifted [limited?] spiritual gifts.

But that looks like having man determining what the spiritual gifts are since men determine who is to be ordained. I didn't think that was possible. I have said before that if I temporary lost my mind (more than usual) and decided to go on some sort of unchristian and perverse "mission" in order to prove a point, I think I could enter a Catholic seminary and wind up being ordained as a Catholic priest. You could do the same at a Baptist seminary. We could both say whatever we needed to say and jump through whatever hoops were necessary. But then, it appears that under Catholicism I would be given spiritual gifts by (through?) other men and it would all be a fraud. That's why I would think that spiritual gifts can ONLY come from God directly.