This contribution, which spans the Council of Trent (1545-1563) and Vatican II (1962-1965), focuses on the figure of the Catholic priest, the main actor in the ecclesiastical system and therefore, in some cases, the protagonist within a system of abuse of power and sexual abuse. Starting from catechisms and manuals of Christian doctrine, rather than texts written for an elite group of theologians, we analyse widely disseminated discourses that have favoured the establishment of recurring representations and a sort of collective knowledge around the ontological otherness and superiority of the priest, progressively removed from the community of believers to which he belonged by virtue of baptism. The practice of reverent obedience on the one hand, and the exercise of power over souls for the salvation of fellow human beings on the other, are two complementary aspects of a system of power that, in certain contexts, has abused and continues to abuse its authority.