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The Laity in the Life of the Parish
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 30 August 2024
Extract
Mgr George Talbot thought, in the last century, that the role of the layman was to hunt, fish and shoot and leave the running of the Church to the ecclesiastics. For better or for worse the laity are no longer fully occupied with these agreeable pursuits on their way to heaven and they have had to turn to more worldly affairs, acquiring on the way a variety of skills much needed in the service of the Church. At the same time, the laity have been able to measure the competence of ecclesiastics to manage worldly affairs and they have not invariably been impressed.
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- Research Article
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- Copyright
- Copyright © 1963 Provincial Council of the English Province of the Order of Preachers
Footnotes
1
A paper read to a regional conference of the Newman Association on ‘The Modern Layman’, at Coventry in March 1963.
References
2 cf. Pius XII at the second “World Congress Lay Apostolate, 1957. He said that it would show a failure to appreciate the real nature of the Church and her social character to distinguish in her a purely active element, the ecclesiastical authorities, and … a purely passive element, the laity. Relations between the Church and the world require the intervention of lay apostles.
3 cf. Pius XII again: ‘The layman should be entrusted with tasks that he can fulfil as well as, or even better than, the priest and within the limits of his functions or those indicated by the common welfare of the Church, he should be allowed to act freely and to exercise his responsibility.’