The Role of the Catholic Laity

The Role of the Catholic Laity
Tuesday, Oct. 23, 2007
Dear Brother Bishops, From the Vatican, June 5th, 1998. Pope John Paul II:
1. With great joy in the Lord I welcome you, the Pastors of the Church in the States of Minnesota, North Dakota and South Dakota, on your ad limina visit…. Today I wish to reflect on the laity in the Church’s life and mission. The new evangelization that can make the twenty-first century a springtime of the Gospel is a task for the entire people of God, but will depend in a decisive way on the lay faithful being fully aware of their baptismal vocation for bringing the good news of Jesus Christ to their culture and society…. mission of the lay faithful,… to give a glad and prompt response to the impulse of the Holy Spirit and the voice of Christ…. More and more lay people have taken to heart the stirring words of Pope Pius XII: “Lay believers are in the front line of Church life; for them the Church is the animating principle of human society. Therefore, they in particular ought to have an ever clearer consciousness not only of belonging to the Church, but of being the Church.”…

4. As the Fathers at the 1987 Synod on the Laity pointed out, it is an inadequate understanding of the role of the laity which leads lay and women to become so strongly interested in Church services and tasks that they fail to become actively involved in their responsibilities in the professional, social, cultural and political field…. Since lay people are at the forefront of the Church’s mission to evangelize all areas of human activity – including the workplace, the worlds of science and medicine, the world of politics, and the diverse world of culture – they must be strong enough and sufficiently catechized….

5. The immediate and in many ways most important arena of the laity’s Christian witness is marriage and the family…. But where the family is weak, all human relationships are exposed to instability and fragmentation. At a time when the very definitions of marriage and family are endangered by attempts to enshrine alternative and distorted notions of these basic human communities, your ministry must include the clear proclamation of the truth of God’s original design. Since the Christian family is the “domestic church”…

7. The multi-cultural reality of American society is a source of enrichment for the Church, but it also presents challenges to pastoral action. Many Dioceses, because of past and continuing immigration, have a strong Hispanic presence…. The fostering of personal and family prayer, a spiritual and liturgical life centered on the Eucharist and genuine Marian devotion…. The Hispanic faithful should be able to feel that their natural place, their spiritual home, is in the heart of the Catholic community.

For the informed laity our most powerful weapon after prayer is the truth. All Catholics need to be informed that there is a Catholic-in-name-only religion in America. This is a false religion. CINOPS are the role models for this false religion which directly and indirectly promotes the culture of death in America. These are the absolute evils of abortion on demand, assisted suicide, euthanasia, same-sex marriage and embryonic stem-cell research. The CINOP hides behind the prudential Catholic Social program. But he with others is a public member of the biggest religious con-operation in U.S. history.
The bishops, priests and laity need to work harder for the conversion of the CINOP. Can we learn anything from the life of Bishop Fulton Sheen? There is no Catholic reason to be a CINOP or to vote for him.
The laity will continue to inform, educate and persuade for a No Vote for any Catholic-in-name-only politician on the ballot in 2008 and thereafter. And this will be done successfully.
George H. Kubeck, Duplicate and or translate into Spanish.