What We Have Seen and Heard

Fostering Baptismal Witness in the World

Connors

• Publisher: Pickwick Publications
• Year: 2017
• eBook ISBN: 9781532602009
• Topic: Théologie et religion
• Subtopic: Religion

One of the chief challenges of the Second Vatican Council was to reclaim the meaning of baptism, especially as the foundation of service and mission in the world. Fifty years after the close of that watershed gathering, nineteen distinguished religious leaders and scholars reexamine that challenge and its implications for preaching and ministry today. This book reinvigorates an important conversation.

1

Intensifying the Apostolic Activity of God’s People1

—Joseph W. Tobin, C.Ss.R.

I am grateful for this opportunity to celebrate the fiftieth anniversary of the close of the Second Vatican Council. My reflection recalls a particular interest of the council: the desire to recognize the dignity of all the baptized and to empower them to fulfill their vocation in the church.

All forms of Christian preaching ultimately are grounded in baptism, the sacrament by which we are called into the Christian life and sent into the world as witnesses and servants. For the baptized, this witness does not take place primarily within the church’s liturgy, but rather, facing the world and immersed in the world. Here service and mission will go hand in hand with spoken witness to the living presence of God.

Three conciliar documents will illuminate this claim: the Pastoral Constitution on the Church in the Modern World, Gaudium et Spes; the Decree on the Mission Activity of the Church, Ad Gentes; and the Decree on the Apostolate of the Laity, Apostolicam Actuositatem. I will limit this modest contribution to the last of the three.

If we were to consider simply the path of the Decree on the Apostolate of the Laity, Apostolicam Actuositatem, from the introduction of its schema into the council on October 6, 1964, through its solemn promulgation by Paul VI on November 18, 1965, this chapter would be considerably shorter. Important though the schema was, it was for the most part non-controversial, and the discussion in the plenary session lasted only a week.2 During that debate, the intervention that may have raised the greatest number of episcopal eyebrows was made by a bishop from Croatia, Stjepan Bauerlein, who proposed that the “first and principal task” of the lay apostolate was the begetting of children, since one reason for the shortage of vocations to the priesthood was the low birthrate in Christian families!3 Even without including that practical prescription, the decree eventually was approved with 2,305 votes in favor and only six opposed.4

When Apostolicam Actuositatem encouraged lay people to take an active role in the work of the church, it was carried by momentum already underway. The decree affirmed that the laity have an apostolate in the church that has its sacramental basis in baptism and confirmation. The apostolate of the church and of all its members is “primarily designed to manifest Christ’s message by words and deeds and to communicate His grace to the world.”5

The role of the laity and their participation in the ministry of the church has evolved considerably over the last five decades. Consider, for example, the growth in this country of a particular form of the lay apostolate, lay ecclesial ministry.6 A survey by the Center for Applied Research in the Apostolate (CARA), published in 2011, underscored the sheer number of people enrolled in lay ecclesial ministry formation programs.7 Over a ten-year period, even at its lowest point, the number of candidates in such programs was well above the combined enrollments in seminary and diaconate formation programs. After peaking in the early 2000s, the total number dropped sharply until stabilizing more recently; lay ecclesial ministry formation enrollments are more volatile than enrollments in seminary and diaconate formation programs. The study highlighted another interesting factor related to the number of lay ecclesial ministers enrolled in formation programs—the number of available programs themselves. When the number of programs drops, the number of students drops; the initial drop in programs precedes the drop in enrollments.8

In 2014–15, CARA identified 215 active lay ecclesial ministry formation programs and received program information from 187. The number of candidates enrolled in degree and certificate programs in 2014–15 was 22,145, slightly above the five-year average of 20,689 from 2010–2015. This year, 17,104 (77 percent) are working toward a certificate in ministry and 5,041 (23 percent) are working toward a graduate degree in ministry.9

As impressive as the development of lay ecclesial ministry has been,10 in my opinion, it would be myopic for the church to bet the farm on this particular form. Allow me to tell you why by means of a little parable about preaching. I will then inflict on you another story with the hope of showing a way forward for our reflection.

Two Stories about Preaching

Talking to Ourselves

The first story is set in Chicago where, twenty-five years ago, I pastored a parish on the North Side. I still have contact with many of those parishioners and, last spring, a young dad wrote to tell me about a conversation he had with his seven-year-old son, walking home after Sunday mass. It seems that Tom, the dad, couldn’t quite figure out what Father was trying to say in the homily. So, he consulted young Sam, who paid close attention to everything going on in church, since he was preparing to make his first communion later that spring.

Tom asked, “Sam, who do you think Father was talking to today, the grown-ups or the kids?” Sam pondered this weighty question, then looked up with a big smile and replied, “I think he was talking to himself!”—thereby putting his young finger on an occupational hazard for preachers.

The United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) has given high priority to lay ecclesial ministry as a “great gift to the church, arising from the distinct vocation and mission of the laity.”11 Ten years ago, the bishops issued a resource to guide the development of lay ecclesial ministry entitled Co-Workers in the Vineyard,12 which was the subject of several symposia, including a study day that preceded the spring assembly of the episcopal conference just two weeks ago. There is no doubt that the different forms of lay ecclesial ministry are a gift to mission of the church in this country.

However, I wonder if the trenchant observations of a statement made thirty-eight years ago by a group of prominent Catholics in Chicago might not still be valid. Their statement, entitled “Declaration of Concern by 47 Chicago Area Catholics: Devaluing the Role of the Laity,” was issued on December 12, 1977, and later p...

Table of contents

• Title Page
• Preface
• Contributors
• Chapter 1: Intensifying the Apostolic Activity of God’s People
• Chapter 2: The Ecumenical Renewal of Baptismal Spirituality
• Chapter 3: A Wider Witness
• Chapter 4: Gaudium et Spes
• Chapter 5: What We Have Seen and Heard in the One Spirit Given to All
• Chapter 6: From “Missions” to “Mission”
• Chapter 7: A Baptismal Faith That Does Justice
• Chapter 8: Religious Witness in the Struggle against Apartheid
• Chapter 9: Spiritualities of Lay Witness in the World
• Chapter 10: Hispanic Lay Movements in the Postconciliar Church
• Chapter 11: The Domestic Church and Witness
• Chapter 12: Baptismal Witness in the World of Commerce
• Chapter 13: Lay Ecclesial Ministry as One Flowering of Baptismal Witness
• Chapter 14: The Vocation of the Lay Theologian as Baptismal Witness
• Chapter 15: Naomi and Ruth in the House of Bread
• Chapter 16: Preaching to the Baptized in a Secular Age
• Chapter 17: A Priesthood Worthy of Gaudium et Spes and Apostolicam Actuositatem
• Chapter 18: Rebuilding a Vital Parish Culture
• Chapter 19: The Legacy and Challenge of the Council in a World Church