Chapter 44. The Ordinances of the Apostles, that There Might Be No Contention Respecting the Priestly Office.
Our apostles also knew, through our Lord Jesus Christ, that there would be strife on account of the office of the episcopate. For this reason, therefore, inasmuch as they had obtained a perfect fore-knowledge of this, they appointed those [ministers] already mentioned, and afterwards gave instructions, that when these should fall asleep, other approved men should succeed them in their ministry. We are of opinion, therefore, that those appointed by them, or afterwards by other eminent men, with the consent of the whole church, and who have blamelessly served the flock of Christ, in a humble, peaceable, and disinterested spirit, and have for a long time possessed the good opinion of all, cannot be justly dismissed from the ministry. For our sin will not be small, if we eject from the episcopate those who have blamelessly and holily fulfilled its duties. Blessed are those presbyters who, having finished their course before now, have obtained a fruitful and perfect departure [from this world]; for they have no fear lest any one deprive them of the place now appointed them. But we see that you have removed some men of excellent behaviour from the ministry, which they fulfilled blamelessly and with honour.
Perhaps this might help you?
Priest
http://www.newadvent.org/cathen/12406a.htm
Excerpts..
This word (etymologically “elder”, from presbyteros, presbyter) has taken the meaning of “sacerdos”, from which no substantive has been formed in various modern languages (English, French, German). The priest is the minister of Divine worship, and especially of the highest act of worship, sacrifice. In this sense, every religion has its priests, exercising more or less exalted sacerdotal functions as intermediaries between man and the Divinity (cf. Hebrews 5:1: “for every high priest taken from among men, is ordained for men in the things that appertain to God, that he may offer up gifts and sacrifices for sins”). In various ages and countries we find numerous and important differences: the priest properly so called may be assisted by inferior ministers of many kinds; he may belong to a special class or caste, to a clergy, or else may be like other citizens except in what concerns his sacerdotal functions; he may be a member of a hierarchy, or, on the contrary, may exercise an independent priesthood (e.g. Melchisedech, Hebrews 7:1-33); lastly, the methods of recruiting the ministers of worship, the rites by which they receive their powers, the authority that establishes them, may all differ. But, amid all these accidental differences, one fundamental idea is common to all religions: the priest is the person authoritatively appointed to do homage to God in the name of society, even the primitive society of the family (cf. Job 1:5), and to offer Him sacrifice (in the broad, but especially in the strict sense of the word). Omitting further discussion of the general idea of the priesthood, and neglecting all reference to pagan worship, we may call attention to the organization among the people of God of a Divine service with ministers properly so-called: the priests, the inferior clergy, the Levites, and at their head the high-priest. We know the detailed regulations contained in Leviticus as to the different sacrifices offered to God in the Temple at Jerusalem, and the character and duty of the priests and Levites. Their ranks were recruited, in virtue not of the free choice of individuals, but of descent in the tribe of Levi (especially the family of Aaron), which had been called by God to His ritual service to the exclusion of all others. The elders (presbyteroi) formed a kind of council, but had no sacerdotal power; it was they who took counsel with the chief priests to capture Jesus (Matthew 26:3). It is this name presbyter (elder) which has passed into the Christian speech to signify the minister of Divine service, the priest.
The Christian law also has necessarily its priesthood to carry out the Divine service, the principal act of which is the Eucharistic Sacrifice, the figure and renewal of that of Calvary. This priesthood has two degrees: the first, total and complete, the second an incomplete participation of the first. The first belongs to the bishop. The bishop is truly a priest (sacerdos), and even a high-priest; he has chief control of the Divine worship (sacrorum antistes), is the president of liturgical meetings; he has the fullness of the priesthood, and administers all the sacraments. The second degree belongs to the priest (presbyter), who is also a sacerdos, but of the second rank (”secundi sacerdotes” Innocent I ad Eugub.); by his priestly ordination he receives the power to offer sacrifice (i.e. to celebrate the Eucharist), to forgive sins, to bless, to preach, to sanctify, and in a word to fulfil the non-reserved liturgical duties or priestly functions. In the exercise of these functions, however, he is subject to the authority of the bishop to whom he has promised canonical obedience; in certain cases even he requires not only authorization, but real jurisdiction, particularly to forgive sins and to take care of souls. Moreover, certain acts of the sacerdotal power, affecting the society of which the bishop is the head, are reserved to the latter — e.g. confirmation, the final rite of Christian initiation, ordination, by which the ranks of the clergy are recruited, and the solemn consecration of new temples to God. Sacerdotal powers are conferred on priests by priestly ordination, and it is this ordination which puts them in the highest rank of the hierarchy after the bishop.
As the word sacerdos was applicable to both bishops and priests, and one became a presbyter only by sacerdotal ordination, the word presbyter soon lost its primitive meaning of “ancient” and was applied only to the minister of worship and of the sacrifice (hence our priest). Originally, however, the presbyteri were the members of the high council which, under the presidency of the bishop, administered the affairs of the local church. Doubtless in general these members entered the presbyterate only by the imposition of hands which made them priests; however, that there could be, and actually were presbyteri who were not priests, is seen from canons 43-47 of Hippolytus (cf. Duchesne, “Origines du culte chretien”, append.), which show that some of those who had confessed the Faith before the tribunals were admitted into the presbyterium without ordination. These exceptions were, however, merely isolated instances, and from time immemorial ordination has been the sole manner of recruiting the presbyteral order. The documents of antiquity show us the priests as the permanent council, the auxiliaries of the bishop, whom they surround and aid in the solemn functions of Divine Worship. When the bishop is absent, he is replaced by a priest, who presides in his name over the liturgical assembly. The priests replace him especially in the different parts of the diocese, where they are stationed by him; here they provide for the Divine Service, as the bishop does in the episcopal city, except that certain functions are reserved to the latter, and the others are performed with less liturgical solemnity. As the churches multiplied in the country and towns, the priests served them with a permanent title, becoming rectors or titulars. Thus, the bond uniting such priests to the cathedral church gradually became weaker, whereas it grew stronger in the case of those who served in the cathedral with the bishop (i.e. the canons); at the same time the lower clergy tended to decrease in number, inasmuch as the clerics passed through the inferior orders only to arrive at the sacerdotal ordination, which was indispensable for the administration of the churches and the exercise of a useful ministry among the faithful. Hence ordinarily the priest was not isolated, but was regularly attached to a definite church or connected with a cathedral. Accordingly, the Council of Trent (Sess. XXIII, cap. xvi, renewing canon vi of Chalcedon) desires bishops not to ordain any clerics but those necessary or useful to the church or ecclesiastical establishment to which they are to be attached and which they are to serve.
But that is the BIG 'IF'. In order to accept the early fathers as evidence, one must inevitably accept the Romanist premise that their religion has sprung forth whole cloth directly from the Apostles and their immediate successors, as these books ARE their proofs. The whole idea is ludicrous to me - That a Torah believing sect of Judaism, whose Progenitor expounded day and night against the traditions of the Pharisees, would establish instead another religion, based upon a very similar authority-and-tradition model confounds all logic.
Did you know that the Pharisaical argument is the same? Their claim is that there were TWO Torahs delivered at Sinai - The written WORD, as delivered by Moses, and the oral tradition, which was kept by the priests (through succession). And while the written Word was kept inviolate for thousands of years, the dynamic nature of their oral tradition (which eventually was written down in the Talmud and Mishnah) was the very thing which Yeshua decried as 'nullifying the commandments of YHWH.'
It is not merely similar - It is the very same thing... AGAIN.
Since the Messiah's claim against the Pharisees is the defining foundation of impropriety in worship to those who follow the Nazarene (whose ministry, btw, lifts up the Torah), it is absurd to believe that He began anew on those very self-same improprieties (as being 'ok' now, since they are done in His Name). And the closer one tries to push those suddenly 'sanctified' improprieties toward 30AD, the more ludicrous the assertion becomes.
We are blessed to be in possession of the Word of YHWH - The original contract(s), as it were - which are designed by their hierarchy to be different than the religious texts produced by man - YHWH's Words are never retracted or changed - so the old is more important than the new - If the new seeks to change the old, it cannot be from YHWH. Apply that truth to any religion claiming to be of the Messiah (or of YHWH generally), and the fruits of tradition become radically and readily apparent.