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Lay ecclesial ministry is the term adopted by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops to identify the relatively new category of pastoral ministers in the Catholic Church who serve the Church but are not ordained.
Lay ecclesial ministers Lay ecclesial ministry is the term adopted by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops to identify the relatively new category of pastoral ministers in the Catholic Church who serve the Church but are not ordained. Lay ecclesial ministers ...
are coworkers with the
bishop A bishop is an ordained clergy member who is entrusted with a position of authority and oversight in a religious institution. In Christianity, bishops are normally responsible for the governance of dioceses. The role or office of bishop is ca ...
alongside priests and deacons. In other contexts, these may be known as "lay pastoral workers", "pastoral assistants", etc.


Overview

Prior to and since the Second Vatican Council, several ministries that had for a time been retained by the presbyterate (priests) were returned to the laity, and several new forms of ministry emerged. The burgeoning awareness of the vocation of the laity as apostles to the secular world and stewards of the Church's mission as an evangelizer has given rise to the popular term "lay ministry" to refer to the active vocation of all the baptized. This general ministry of the laity has at times also been called the "lay apostolate" and the "lay vocation".For example, by Pope John Paul II in the apostolic exhortatio
''Christifideles Laici''
/ref> Included in this general lay ministry are several specific ministries designed to support the Church community, such as lector/reader, extraordinary minister of Holy Communion, catechist, sponsor/godparent, spouse, parent, etc. In addition to this general lay ministry, there are a number of non-ordained people who have undertaken roles, that immediately prior to Vatican II belonged entirely to the ordained, including parish pastoral and catechetical staff, hospital and
prison chaplains A prison, also known as a jail, gaol (dated, standard English, Australian, and historically in Canada), penitentiary (American English and Canadian English), detention center (or detention centre outside the US), correction center, correcti ...
, campus ministers, and many other diocesan leadership roles. Today, even the Roman Curia includes a small number of lay ecclesial ministers. Lay ecclesial ministry includes a broad category rather than a specific job title. It has been adopted by the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) to "establish a framework to indicate what is common to many roles and responsibilities undertaken by lay persons, for example, Pastoral Coordinator or Moderator of a Parish, Pastoral Associate, Director of Religious Education, Youth Minister, Campus Minister, Hospital Chaplain." According to the USCCB, this ''ecclesial'' ministry includes: * ''Authorization'' of the hierarchy to serve publicly in the local Church * ''Leadership'' in a particular area of ministry * Close ''mutual collaboration'' with the pastoral ministry of bishops, priests, and deacons * Preparation and ''formation'' appropriate to the level of responsibilities that are assigned to them including; human, spiritual, pastoral, and theological dimensions While many bishops are quick to note that this does not represent a new level of the hierarchy, the Church has observed a clear differentiation between Lay Ecclesial Ministry and the general ministry of the laity. Clearly members of the laity, lay ecclesial ministers serve the Church. An ecclesial ministry is one that is directed ''ad intra'' rather than ''ad extra''. The ecclesial vocations serve the Church, while lay vocations are vocations by which the Church serves the world. Programs for the theological education and pastoral formation of laypersons, for the purpose in engaging in full-time and often lifelong ministry in the Church, have grown exponentially in the last four decades. By 2002 there were 34,000 lay ministers who had graduated from United States Lay Ecclesial Ministry Programs. As of 2008, there are more than ten times as many students preparing in university and diocesan divinity programs for a vocation as a Lay Ecclesial Minister, as there are seminarians preparing for the presbyterate. Since 1986, there has even been a Roman college for future lay ecclesial ministers and theologians studying at Pontifical Universities, the Lay Centre at Foyer Unitas. In many dioceses, lay ecclesial ministers already account for the majority of the ecclesial and pastoral ministers alongside deacons and presbyters. According to a study by the National Pastoral Life Center, since at least 2007 the number of Lay Ecclesial Ministers employed in full- or part-time parish ministry (29,000) has exceeded the number of presbyters employed in full- or part-time parish ministry (27,000), and the number of Lay Ecclesial Ministers continues to grow while the number of priests in parish ministry continues to contract. The number of Lay Ecclesial Ministers in parish grew in 2009 to 37,929.p 38. "The Changing Face of U.S. Catholic Parishes" CARA and the Emerging Model Project July 2011 Many more Lay Ecclesial Ministers serve in other Catholic institutions, schools, hospitals, dioceses, etc. The reality of lay ecclesial ministry is experienced in a number of regions. In Germany and the Netherlands, the terms "pastoral worker" or "pastoral assistant" are preferred for those engaged in lay ecclesial ministry. In parts of South America, and islands of the
South Pacific The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean (or, depending on definition, to Antarctica) in the south, and is bounded by the continen ...
, lay ecclesial ministers who are religious educators are called "catechists". In the United States, the term catechist more generally refers to volunteer lay Sunday school teachers, but in a broader meaning also includes Catholic school teachers, as well as clergy and lay ecclesial ministers responsible for overseeing faith formation.


See also

* Associations of the faithful *
Catechism of the Catholic Church The ''Catechism of the Catholic Church'' ( la, Catechismus Catholicae Ecclesiae; commonly called the ''Catechism'' or the ''CCC'') is a catechism promulgated for the Catholic Church by Pope John Paul II in 1992. It aims to summarize, in book f ...
*
List of Ecclesial movements A Catholic lay association, also referred to as Catholic Congress, is an association of lay Catholics aiming to discuss certain political or social issues from a Catholic perspective. The Pontifical Council for the Laity is the body responsible ...
*
Rite of Christian Initiation of Adults The Order of Christian Initiation of Adults (OCIA), or ''Ordo Initiationis Christianae Adultorum'', is a process developed by the Catholic Church for its catechumenate for prospective converts to the Catholic faith above the age of infant bapt ...
(RCIA) * ''Spiritus Domini'' (Pope Francis) *
Universal call to holiness The universal call to holiness is a teaching of the Roman Catholic Church that all people are called to be holy, and is based on Matthew 5:48: "Be you therefore perfect, as also your heavenly Father is perfect" (). In the first book of the Bible, th ...
*
Vocational Discernment in the Catholic Church Vocational discernment is the process in which men or women in the Catholic Church discern, or recognize, their vocation in the church. The vocations are the life as layman in the world, either married or single, the ordained life and the consecrat ...


References


Further reading

*''Co-Workers in the Vineyard of the Lord: A Resource for Guiding the Development of Lay Ecclesial Ministry'' USCCB Publication

* ''Lay Ecclesial Ministry: The State of the Questions'' USCCB Publication

* ''Official Standards:National Certification Standards for Ecclesial Lay Ministers.'' NALM Publications

* Fox, Zeni. ''New Ecclesial Ministry: Lay Professionals Serving the Church'', Sheed & Ward, 2002

* ''A Prophetic Stance of the Heart: Collaborative Ministry Today'', Concerned Catholic Ministers, 2006


External links

*USCCB Committee on Lait
Subcommittee on Lay Ministry

National Association of Lay Ministry

Co-Workers in the Vineyard: Online Portal for Lay Ecclesial Ministers
{{catholicism Catholic ecclesiastical titles Catholic laity