Why a Priest?

What is priest, and why do we need one?
This is the question that the Book of Leviticus sets out to answer, beginning in Chapter 1, verse 2:
    "When any man of you brings an offering to the Lord, you shall bring them from the herd or from the flock."
What then?  You can't exactly place an animal on an offering plate.  The offerings required of ancient Israel were not money, but agricultural produce, perhaps a cow or bull, a sheep, a dove, or grain and oil. But it must be the best available, God says to Moses, "without blemish," the choicest example.
As a burnt offering, it was to be immolated, reduced to ashes, and used up.
Wouldn't it be a strange thing if the cash on an average collection plate in a church were to be thrown onto a bonfire and incinerated?  What a waste!  All those checks and bills and change.  It would be like throwing away the work of our hands!
What is the point?  Leviticus continues:
    "He shall offer it at the tent of the meeting, that he many be accepted before the Lord."
The purpose is made even clearer in the symbolic laying of his hand upon the creature's head:  "and it shall be accepted for him to make atonement for him." vss. 3 and 4.  It is offering to atone for his sin.
But how can an unacceptable, sinful human being approach the perfection of the presence of God?
The creature, whatever it might be, is to be killed, " and the sons of Aaron, the priests shall present the blood, and throw it round about against the altar that is at the door of the tent of meeting." It was an unforgettable, unmistakable scene.  "And the priest shall offer the whole, and burn it upon the altar, it is a burnt offering, an offering by fire, a pleasing odor to the Lord." vss. 5 & 13, --a kind of holy barbeque.
A priest provides the necessary connection between man and God, is a link, or a great bridge, (in Latin "Pontifex Maximus,") between us and our Maker, re-connecting earth to heaven, the sinful to the sinless.  Without a priest, how could we do it?
Let's think about this as we explore the Book of Leviticus together.