The title of this node will no doubt send some into a screaming frenzy: how dare you imply that the priesthood is the pinnacle of putting on airs, false faces, that sort of thing? I find it interesting that many people think of acting in such a negative way. As an actor, I do not think of acting as a business of faking, but rather of making; when one acts, one seeks to "make belief" rather than "fake belief" -- another node altogether.

When my performance in a show is clicking, when I am "on the money," so to speak, in some indescribeable way, my own personality hops into the passenger seat, and the character that I am portraying takes the wheel. In many respects, I feel that I become the character; Jason is still there, but he has temporarily stepped aside to allow the character to exist.

In the theological language of the Roman Catholic Church, when the priest is functioning in a liturgical context, he is functioning in persona Christi, which literally translates as "in the person of Christ". What this phrase means is that, while the priest is still ontologically himself, he quite literally becomes Christ.

What makes this the apex of acting is that the "character" the priest becomes during liturgy is not a fictional character; in a very real sense, the priest becomes the second person of the Trinity, the Son of God – Christ gets into the driver's seat while the priest takes to the passenger seat.

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