In a previous post, I discussed some of the biblical evidences in favour of an ordained, ministerial priesthood in the New Testament, as well as some common objections thereto (also see this post). With respect to the evidence from early Christianity, the late Catholic scholar, Louis Bouyer, discussed some of the issues that are sometimes brought up by critics of such a perspective (e.g. RPC Hanson, Christian Priesthood Examined). Under an excursus entitled, “Presbyter et Sacerdos” (Latin: Elder and Priest), we read the following:
If, as we have seen for Christian antiquity, the whole body of the Church, including the faithful laity, must be associated with the priesthood of Christ, particularly in the Eucharistic celebration, what must be thought of the application to the pastoral ministry, first of the bishops and then of the “presbyters,” their associates, of the sacerdotal expressions? In fact, today in the Catholic (or Orthodox) Church, when we say “priest,” we think immediately of sacredos, rather than presbyter.
We must point out that, since subapostolic times, we see assimilation between the function of the bishop, presiding over the Eucharistic sunaxis, and that of the “high priest” of the Old covenant. As the simple presbyters, associated with the bishops, gradually replaced the in this function, this expression of a sacerdotal character par excellence was also applied to their own ministry. The matter must be considered perfectly legitimate if we observe that the pastoral function in the Church of the bishop and the presbyter, to the extent that the latter is called by the bishop to share in his function, is a ministry of Christ, of his presence as head in the midst of his body, to all generations everywhere.
By union with and participation in Christ, all are priests in the Church in one sense, in the unity of their common attachment to Christ by the ministry that he instituted to this end in the apostles. The ecclesiastical ministry as a ministry of the Head—of his presence as Head in the midst of his body, to continue to gather it in this unity of the Spirit, of whom Jesus alone is the source, and thus allow it to participate in Christ’s sacerdotal action—is therefore, properly, the ministry of the priesthood of Jesus. As with all the gifts of Jesus to his Church, the ministry of this priesthood exists only to permit everyone to participate in it in unity.
Separated from their legitimate pastors (i.e., those in the apostolic successions), as we have explained, the baptised faithful are incapable of being brought together in a Church which is that of Christ so as to exercise in it, as members of his body, the priesthood, which remains forever his.
This does not mean that God cannot occasionally make use of an irregular ministry to communicate his graces (just as he can, on occasion, dispense with every sacrament, even baptism). But this could not rescind the fact that a break with the apostolic succession implies that the Church of Christ can no longer be assembled locally, that his body, both mystical and Eucharistic, has no longer any objective, real presence among us and, therefore, that his priesthood is no longer the object of common participation by the faithful in a Eu-charist which would be truly his . . . The idea of a “presbyteral succession,” which could palliate defect of the apostolic succession, seems to us in radical contradiction with the very nature of the presbyterate: that is, and can only be, representation of a local community of the Church to the ministry sent by Christ to his body, which alone, for this reason, can be the object of a succession. This succession is, in effect, only a succession in the sending: of the Father to the Son, of the Son to the preeminent apostles, of these apostles to the bishop, whom priests do not succeed (any more than they succeed one another) but are associated with in each generation.
Source: Louis Bouyer, The Church of God: Body of Christ and Temple of the Spirit (Ignatius, 2011), 596-97.
For Further Reading:
Albert Cardinal Vanhoye, Old Testament Priests and the New Priest According to the New Testament (Gracewing Publishing, 2009)--discusses the solid biblical foundation for a New Testament Priesthood. Vanhoye is an expert in the Epistle to the Hebrews, and interacts with much of the alleged "proof-texts" that are said to preclude anyone holding the Priesthood apart from Jesus Christ Himself.
John A. Tvedtnes, Joseph Smith and the Ancient World (Forthcoming; should be coming out in 2015)--will have a discussion on the early Christian evidences for the Priesthood.