What Is the Laity?: A Deep Dive into Lumen Gentium (Part 3)

Anyone who knew Fr. Hesburgh and had a spare half hour will remember that he told many stories about his dissertation. He ramped up the story by first telling one the topic, Theology of the Laity, and then letting us know how the authorities over his doctorate thought that was a ridiculous topic, that there was no such theology, and were in general scandalized by the idea. Perhaps the degree of scandal grew in the telling of the story. In any event, his point was that he was ahead of his time and was amply vindicated by Lumen Gentium chapter 4! May he rest in peace.

In general, the mystery of the Church designated with the phrase “The People of God” recalls, as already mentioned, the People of God, Israel. The title applied to the whole people, but it made it possible to recognize distinctions within the one People, in rank and function, between, for example, priests and Levites, prophets, monarchs, lay Israelites (= neither priest nor Levite), etc. The phrase emphasizes unity amidst a diversity of office and function, and so it does here: “Everything that has been said above concerning the People of God is intended for the laity, religious and clergy alike.” And yet, “Having set forth the functions of the hierarchy, the Sacred Council gladly turns its attention to the state of those faithful called the laity” because “there are certain things which pertain in a special way to the laity, both men and women, by reason of their condition and mission. Due to the special circumstances of our time the foundations of this doctrine must be more thoroughly examined” (LG §30).

Then comes a brief statement of the “foundations” of this doctrine: “For their pastors . . . know that they were not ordained by Christ to take upon themselves alone the entire salvific mission of the Church toward the world. On the contrary they understand that it is their noble duty to shepherd the faithful and to recognize their ministries and charisms, so that all according to their proper roles may cooperate in this common undertaking with one mind” (LG §30). It may be true that not all the pastors “knew” this. Prepared for by earlier twentieth-century theology, it was nevertheless a surprising idea for many who tended to identify the mission of the Church with the mission of the hierarchy. It is due to the recovery of the biblical and patristic emphasis on the common priesthood of all the baptized (NB, not of “all believers”) that a particular sphere of mission unique to the laity rose to view.

And so we read, in the next section,

The term laity is here understood to mean all the faithful except those in holy orders and those in the state of religious life specially approved by the Church. These faithful are by baptism made one body with Christ and are constituted among the People of God;[1] they are in their own way made sharers in the priestly, prophetical, and kingly functions of Christ [my own italics]; and they carry out for their own part the mission of the whole Christian people in the Church and in the world (LG §31).

Note the unity of the phrases, “one body with Christ,” and “People of God” in the same sentence. There is no disjunction. But rather, “People of God” offers an opportunity to think about differentiation within the one Body.

What specifically characterizes the laity is their secular nature. . . . [T]hose in holy orders are by reason of their particular vocation especially and professedly ordained to the sacred ministry. Similarly, by their state in life, religious give splendid and striking testimony that the world cannot be transformed and offered to God without the spirit of the beatitudes. But the laity, by their very vocation, seek the kingdom of God by engaging in temporal affairs and by ordering them according to the plan of God. They live in the world . . . (LG §31).

Of course, everyone lives in the world, one way or another. By “secular,” the Council is thinking of “the ordinary circumstances of family and social life” (ibid.). But still, it is interesting to think of how the Church herself is “in the world,” as, in Christ, a “sacrament of unity” (LG §1): “The Church, . . . the kingdom of Christ now present in mystery, grows visibly through the power of God in the world” (LG §3); “By the power of the risen Lord it is given strength that it might . . . reveal to the world, faithfully though darkly, the mystery of its Lord until, in the end, it will be manifested in full light” (LG §8). The Church is the “light of the world and the salt of the earth sent forth into the whole world” (see Matt 5:13-16) (LG §9, emphasis added).

In that sense, the Church herself is “secular,” living in the world. The Church is not an “unworldly” and invisible spiritual society untouched by the world, for as already cited,

the society structured with hierarchical organs and the Mystical Body of Christ, are not to be considered as two realities, nor are the visible assembly and the spiritual community, nor the earthly Church and the Church enriched with heavenly things; rather they form one complex reality which coalesces from a divine and a human element (LG §8).

In the People of God, the ordained ministry is essentially not ordered toward the world, but toward the Church, toward the building up of the baptismal priesthood which is the Church vis-à-vis the world. It is the priesthood of the baptized, its spiritual sacrifices expressed most fully in the Eucharistic sacrifice, that defines the mystery of the Church as in the world but not of the world. This is the mystery of Church life.

If, according to Pope John Paul II, “the priest is placed not only in the Church but also in the forefront of the Church” (Pastores Dabo Vobis §16, citing the Synod of Bishops on the Priesthood),[2] because of their role in acting in the person of Christ the Head, it is also true, as Pope Pius XII declared in a 1946 address, that the lay faithful are on the “front lines of the Church’s life.” The life of those exercising the baptismal priesthood is the life of the Church in the world, is Church life, or, another way of looking at it, Church, thought of vis-à-vis the world, is essentially lay.

But therefore this does not mean that the laity are “secular” in the common understanding of the term, as though their identity and vocations were essentially non-sacred. It is almost unbearably tempting to think this way, without noticing it, as though the laity were essentially not only in the world but of the world, as though they were secular agents who are present in the Church as secular agents who could be acting as they do in any organization, but just happen to be in the Church, and as though the world with the Church in it were the same old world as ever, unchanged in character by having the Church in it, just one more charitable organization among many. We can begin to think of the laity as building the Kingdom of God by secular projects, so that the Kingdom of God becomes itself conceived in the imagination as essentially a secular project, a function of our works, of our goals, thus in effect replacing the Church, as “the Kingdom of Christ, now present in mystery,” with a secular project, a utopia, complete, in the most extreme cases, with a secular eschatology such as on offer in Marxism.

To “secularize” the laity in this way is, then, to secularize the visible Church, to deflate its mystery, relocating Church life into secular projects enacted by secular people who may need the encouragement of communal worship get-togethers, etc., but do not necessarily need it and can have other, equally potent, sources of exhortation and motivation.

This is not the vision of Lumen Gentium:

But the laity, by their very vocation, seek the kingdom of God by engaging in temporal affairs and by ordering them according to the plan of God. They live in the world . . . [t]hey are called there by God that by exercising their proper function and led by the spirit of the Gospel they may work for the sanctification of the world from within as a leaven. In this way they may make Christ known to others, especially by the testimony of a life resplendent in faith, hope, and charity (LG §31).

It is not a political program as such that “sanctifies” the world, but life lived in which the “stuff” of the world becomes the “stuff” of spiritual sacrifice such that it is lived in faith, hope, and love, “making Christ known to others” by the witness of sanctity even in the most ordinary non-political venues of life, like the family. Sanctity in the ordinary domains of life in the world is the “leaven” that leavens the whole lump, the whole world.

This is what it means to say that the laity have an “apostolate,” a sharing in the Apostolic mission of the Church: “The lay apostolate . . . is a participation in the salvific mission of the Church itself. Through their baptism and confirmation all are commissioned to that apostolate by the Lord himself. Moreover, by the sacraments, especially the holy Eucharist, that charity toward God and man which is the soul of the apostolate is communicated and nourished. Now the laity are called in a special way to make the Church present and operative in those places and circumstances where only through them can it become the salt of the earth. Thus every lay person, in virtue of the very gifts bestowed upon him or her, is at the same time a witness and a living instrument of the mission of the Church itself” (LG §33).

LG Chapter 4 goes on to specify this apostolate in terms of the threefold vocation of Christ to which all Christians are configured at Baptism.

“Priest”:

The supreme and eternal Priest, Christ Jesus, since he wills to continue his witness and service also through the laity, . . . gives them a sharing in his priestly function of offering spiritual worship for the glory of God and the salvation of men. For this reason the laity, dedicated to Christ and anointed by the Holy Spirit, are marvelously called and wonderfully prepared so that ever more abundant fruits of the Spirit may be produced in them. For all their works, prayers and apostolic endeavors, their ordinary married and family life, their daily occupations, their physical and mental relaxation, if carried out in the Spirit, and even the hardships of life, if patiently borne—all these become spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ (see 1 Pet 2:5). Together with the offering of the Lord's body, they are most fittingly offered in the celebration of the Eucharist. Thus, as those everywhere who adore in holy activity, the laity consecrate the world itself to God (LG §34).

“Prophet”:

Christ, the great Prophet, who proclaimed the Kingdom of his Father both by the testimony of his life and the power of his words, continually fulfills his prophetic office until the complete manifestation of glory. He does this not only through the hierarchy who teach in his name and with his authority, but also through the laity whom he made his witnesses and to whom he gave understanding of the faith (sensu fidei) and an attractiveness in speech (cf. Acts 2:12-18; Rev 19) so that the power of the Gospel might shine forth in their daily social and family life. They conduct themselves as children of the promise, and thus strong in faith and in hope they make the most of the present (see Eph 5:16; Col 4:5), and with patience await the glory that is to come (see Rom 8:25). Let them not, then, hide this hope in the depths of their hearts, but even in the program of their secular life let them express it by a continual conversion and by wrestling against the world-rulers of this darkness, against the spiritual forces of wickedness (Eph 6:12). Just as the sacraments of the New Law, by which the life and the apostolate of the faithful are nourished, prefigure a new heaven and a new earth, so too the laity go forth as powerful proclaimers of a faith in things to be hoped for, when they courageously join to their profession of faith a life springing from faith. This evangelization, that is, this announcing of Christ by a living testimony as well as by the spoken word, takes on a specific quality and a special force in that it is carried out in the ordinary surroundings of the world (LG §35).

The rest of LG §35 points especially to married and family life as a locus of this prophetic office. It is an element in “the evangelization of the world.”

“King”:

Christ, becoming obedient even unto death and because of this exalted by the Father (see Phil 2:8-9) entered into the glory of his kingdom. To him all things are made subject until he subjects himself and all created things to the Father that God may be all in all (see 1 Cor 15:27-28). Now Christ has communicated this royal power to his disciples that they might be constituted in royal freedom and that by true penance and a holy life they might conquer the reign of sin in themselves (see Rom 6:12) (LG §36).

Note that the “kingship” of the Christian is not to preside over the development of a secular polity that is thought to be or overlay the Kingdom of God, but it is to rule over sin in oneself in the freedom imparted by sacramental grace.

Further, he has shared this power so that serving Christ in their fellow men they might by humility and patience lead their brethren to that King for whom to serve is to reign. But the Lord wishes to spread his kingdom also by means of the laity, namely, “a kingdom of truth and life, a kingdom of holiness and grace, a kingdom of justice, love and peace.”[3] In this kingdom creation itself will be delivered from its slavery to corruption into the freedom of the glory of the sons of God (see Rom 8:21). Clearly then a great promise and a great trust is committed to the disciples: All things are yours, and you are Christ's, and Christ is God's (1 Cor 3:23).

This is obviously not in the first instance a call whose primary activity is building a polity of justice and peace imagined in secular terms as though that were building the kingdom, for no earthly polity, no work of our hands, can “deliver creation from its slavery to corruption.” To think this way would be to deny the status of the Church as “on pilgrimage,” a stranger in a strange land (Ex 2:22, see LG §8 for the citation of this verse through the citation of Augustine, City of God 18.51.2). The kingdom of truth, life, holiness, grace, justice, love and peace is, in the passage immediately preceding this in the Preface to the Eucharistic Prayer on the feast of Christ the King, “an eternal and universal kingdom,” which we can in no way bring about by our power or work. Instead, the Church is on pilgrimage, journeying towards this kingdom, not trying to replace it by the political actions of the laity.

Still, this is not a sectarian view of the Church. Layfolk are just as much “strangers in a strange land” as is the Church herself, but their presence in the world, like the presence of the Church in the world, means that the world itself is different, is less “strange,” meaning less “foreign” to God and the purposes of God, since it is the very stuff of life in the world that, by becoming the “stuff” of spiritual sacrifice, of prophetic witness to the faith, and of exercising the dominion of the Lord over the rule of sin in each of us, we see that the ordinary aspects of life in the world are not stuff to be rejected, but rather taken up and are the domain of this transformation. But this whole idea collapses if, in effect, the essentially ecclesial identity of the laity is bleached out in favor of an essentially secular identity and the Kingdom replaced with a secular polity. There is no justice, secularly conceived, that can be the basis, or even a stepping stone, to “an eternal and universal kingdom” in which “creation is delivered from its slavery to corruption.”

This does not mean that layfolk should not work for justice in human terms, that they should not “learn the deepest meaning and the value of all creation, as well as its role in the harmonious praise of God.” To the contrary, “They must assist each other to live holier lives even in their daily occupations. In this way the world may be permeated by the spirit of Christ and it may more effectively fulfill its purpose in justice, charity and peace.” Striving for holiness can have, should have, an effect in social life.

The laity have the principal role in the overall fulfillment of this duty. Therefore, by their competence in secular training and by their activity, elevated from within by the grace of Christ, let them vigorously contribute their effort, so that created goods may be perfected by human labor, technical skill and civic culture for the benefit of all men according to the design of the Creator and the light of his Word. May the goods of this world be more equitably distributed among all men, and may they in their own way be conducive to universal progress in human and Christian freedom. In this manner, through the members of the Church, will Christ progressively illumine the whole of human society with his saving light (LG §36).

This will especially mean that

the laity also by their combined efforts [will] remedy the customs and conditions of the world, if they are an inducement to sin, so that they all may be conformed to the norms of justice and may favor the practice of virtue rather than hinder it. By so doing they will imbue culture and human activity with genuine moral values; they will better prepare the field of the world for the seed of the Word of God; and at the same time they will open wider the doors of the Church by which the message of peace may enter the world (ibid.).

The Council recognizes that the “temporal sphere” is “governed by its own principles,” but that does not mean the lay faithful leave behind their “rights and duties” as members of the Church, including the formation of a Christian conscience, because “even in secular business there is no human activity which can be withdrawn from God’s dominion.” “Harmonization” does not mean replacing the vocation of priest, prophet, and king with secular equivalents:

Because of the very economy of salvation the faithful should learn how to distinguish carefully between those rights and duties which are theirs as members of the Church, and those which they have as members of human society. Let them strive to reconcile the two, remembering that in every temporal affair they must be guided by a Christian conscience, since even in secular business there is no human activity which can be withdrawn from God's dominion. In our own time, however, it is most urgent that this distinction and also this harmony should shine forth more clearly than ever in the lives of the faithful, so that the mission of the Church may correspond more fully to the special conditions of the world today. For it must be admitted that the temporal sphere is governed by its own principles, since it is rightly concerned with the interests of this world. But that ominous doctrine which attempts to build a society with no regard whatever for religion, and which attacks and destroys the religious liberty of its citizens, is rightly to be rejected (LG §36).

The laity can also be called to “co-operation in the apostolate of the hierarchy” (LG §33). I take this to be the foundation of what is now called “lay ecclesial ministry.”

“Evangelization,” on the other hand, by “word” as well as by “witness” (see LG §35) flows from the prophetic gift of Baptism and is part of making “the Church present and operative in those places and circumstances where only through them can it become the salt of the earth” (LG §33). I take this as the foundation for true co-responsibility, acknowledging a sphere of true leadership for laity in the apostolates of evangelization, more strictly speaking (that is, by “word”), in the world. Pastors are encouraged to help them, and even encourage them to take up projects on their own initiative (see LG §37).