Lay people fully belong to God’s People and are part of the Mystical Body of Christ through Baptism, sharing in the Church’s life and growth

Having finished his treatment of the Church's ministers in the previous catechesis, the Holy Father turned his attention to the laity in his talk at the General Audience of Wednesday, 27 October. Asserting that the laity are full members of the Church, the Pope mentioned how much the latter benefits from their many works of charity. The Holy Father's address was the 76th in the series on the Church and was given in Italian. 

1. During our catecheses on ecclesiology, first we focused on the Church as the People of God, as a priestly and sacramental community, and then reflected on her various offices and ministries. We went from the Apostles, chosen and sent by Christ, to the Bishops, their successors, to the priests, the Bishops' co-workers, and to the deacons. It is logical then for us to turn our attention to the status and role of the laity, who represent the vast majority of the Populus Dei. We shall do so by following the lead of the Second Vatican Council, but also by again considering the directives and guidelines in the Apostolic Exhortation Christifideles laici, published on 30 December 1988, following the 1987 Synod of Bishops.

2. It is widely known that the word "lay" comes from the Greek term laikÙ s, which in turn derives from laÙ s: people. Thus "lay" means "belonging to the people". In this respect it is a beautiful word. Unfortunately, a long historical development has caused the word "lay", in secular and especially political usage, to acquire the meaning of opposition to religion, in particular, to the Church. It thus expresses an attitude of separation, rejection or, at least, stated indifference. This development is certainly a regrettable fact. 

In Christian usage, however, the "laity" are those belonging to the People of God, more particularly, those who do not have functions and ministries related to the sacrament of Orders and do not belong to the "clergy", according to the traditional distinction between "clerics" and "lay people" (cf. CIC, can. 207, §1). Clerics are sacred ministers, i.e., the Pope, Bishops, priests, deacons; the laity are the other Christifideles, who, together with the Pastors and ministers, constitute the People of God. 

Council recognized dignity of lay people in the Church

After making this distinction, the Code of Canon Law adds that from both groups—clergy and laity—there are faithful consecrated to God in a special way by a canonically recognized profession of the evangelical counsels (can. 207, §2). In accordance with the distinction mentioned above, a certain number of "religious" or "consecrated persons" who take vows but do not receive sacred Orders are included, in this respect, among the laity. However, because of their consecrated state, they have a special place in the Church and so are distinguished from other lay people. For its part, the Council preferred to discuss them separately and considered as lay people those who are neither clerics nor religious (cf. Lumen gentium, n. 31): without implying doctrinal complications or confusion, this further distinction is useful for simplifying and facilitating discussion of the various groups and categories in the Church's structure. 

Here we adopt the threefold distinction mentioned, treating lay people as members of God's People who do not belong to the clergy and are not committed to the religious state or the profession of the evangelical counsels (cf. Christifideles laici, n. 9, and Catechism of the Catholic Church, n. 897, which repeat the Council's concept). After speaking of the status and role of this vast majority of those constituting the People of God, we will then be able to speak of the status and role of the religious Christifideles or those consecrated. 

3. While noting that the laity are not the whole Church, the Council intended fully to recognize their dignity: if, from a ministerial and hierarchical standpoint, sacred Orders put the faithful receiving them in a particular position of authority by virtue of the role assigned them, the laity have full membership in the Church, as much as do sacred ministers or religious. In fact, according to the Council, "they have been incorporated into Christ by Baptism", and have received the indelible sign of their belonging to Christ by virtue of the baptismal "character". They belong to the Mystical Body of Christ. 

On the other hand, the initial consecration through Baptism involves them in the mission of all God's People: "in their way" they "share the priestly, prophetic and kingly office of Christ". Therefore, what we have said in preceding catecheses on the Church as a priestly and prophetic community also applies to the laity, who, together with the Church's members enjoying hierarchical functions and ministries, are called to develop their baptismal potential in communion with Christ, the one Head of the Mystical Body. 

4. The recognition of lay people as full-fledged members of the Church excludes the identification of the latter with the hierarchy alone. It would be too narrow a concept and even an anti-evangelical, anti-theological error to think of the Church exclusively as the hierarchical body: a Church without people! According to the Gospel and Christian tradition, the Church is a community in which there is a hierarchy, indeed, but precisely because there is a people of "laity" who must be served and guided on the ways of the Lord. It is to be hoped that both clerics and lay people would be increasingly aware of this and never regard the Church from the outside, as an organization imposed on them without being their "body", their "soul". Clergy and laity, hierarchy and "non-ordained" faithful, are the one People of God, the one Church, the communion of Christ's followers, since the Church belongs to each and every one, and we are all responsible for her life and growth. Indeed, the words of Pius XII in a 1946 discourse "to the new Cardinals" are still famous: the laity "must have an ever clearer awareness of not only belonging to the Church, but of being the Church" (AAS 38 [1946], p. 149, cited in Christifideles laici, n. 9, and Catechism of the Catholic Church, n. 899). A memorable statement that marked a turning-point in pastoral psychology and sociology in the light of a better theology.

5. This same conviction was affirmed by the Second Vatican Council, as an awareness of the Pastors (cf. Lumen gentium, n. 30). It must be said that in recent decades a clearer and richer awareness of this role developed, with the contribution, in addition to that of Pastors, of outstanding theologians and pastoral experts who, before and after Pius XII's address and the First World Congress for the Lay Apostolate (1951), tried to clarify the theological questions about the lay state in the Church, writing as it were a new chapter of ecclesiology. Also helpful in this regard were meetings and conferences in which scholars and experts with practical, organizational experience compared the results of their reflections and the data obtained from their pastoral and social work. Thus they prepared valuable material for the papal and conciliar Magisterium. However, everything was in continuity with a tradition going back to the earliest Christian times, particularly to Paul's exhortation quoted by the Council (cf. Lumen gentium, n. 30), which requested solidarity of the entire community and called to mind the responsibility of working to build up the Body of Christ (cf. Eph 4:15-16). 

Many lay people live vocation without attracting attention

6. In reality, now and in the past countless lay people have worked and are working in the Church and the world in accordance with the recommendations and the requests of their Pastors. They are quite worthy of admiration! Alongside of those lay people who have a high-profile role, many, many more live their baptismal vocation without attracting attention and spread throughout the Church the benefits of their charity. Out of their silence there flourishes an apostolate made effective and fruitful by the Spirit.