text: One might query this comment by Tom Reese, "We cannot have a Catholic Church without sacraments, and a priest is needed for the Eucharist, confession, and anointing".
  Given that so many have drifted away from the Eucharist and confession, one might query how much people place value on the belief that priests are needed for these things? While I do think many who have drifted away simply "couldn't give a fig" about any of it anymore and are distracted by what the secular world has to offer, I also sense that many also still place importance on the spiritual dimension of life. We humans seem to crave rubric, ritual, liturgy and signs that help us access this spiritual dimension to life. Do they (these lapsi-believers for want of a better term) still have a sense though that they need "priests" in the ways we were brought up to think of the function of priests to mediate our relationship to the spiritual or divine though? ...continued