Quotes About Laity

Humility is a virtue all preach, none practise, and yet every body is content to hear. The master thinks it good doctrine for his servant, the laity for the clergy, and the clergy for the laity.

We cannot build up the idea of the apostolate of the laity without the foundation of the liturgy.

The term 'laity' is one of the worst in the vocabulary of religion and ought to be banished from the Christian conversation.

Individualism. Narcissism. Value-free choices. These are all key elements in the decline of the practice of mutual accountability in Western churches, among clergy and laity alike.

Monasticism was represented as an individual achievement which the mass of the laity could not be expected to emulate. By thus limiting the application of the commandments of Jesus to a restricted group of specialists

Hence, the Reformers dramatically failed to put their finger on the nerve of the original problem: a clergy-led worship service attended by a passive laity.[157] It is not surprising, then, that the Reformers viewed themselves as reformed Catholics.

Thus, the founder of Opus Dei, though he was a priest, did not seek to gather power to the clergy. In fact, he wanted the Catholic laity to discover their own dignity and assume the responsibilities that came with baptism.

The two-tiered spirituality created an artificial separation between the clergy and the laity—and thus between the Church and the world.

Pope Francis has aimed a blow at what the whole hierarchical system is built on: a graded system with the higher clergy in the skyboxes, the devoted religious in festival seating, as they say of the crowds at rock concerts, and, on the bottom, the laity in standing room only.

greater stress on the sacerdotal role of the clergy was part of a larger attempt to reverse the erosion, since the Reformation, of their authority over the laity.

Humility is a virtue all preach, none practise, and yet everybody is content to hear. The master thinks it good doctrine for his servant, the laity for the clergy, and the clergy for the laity.

I have sometimes thought that Catholicism is a religion not suited to the laity, or not suited, at any rate, to the American laity, in whom it seems to bring out some of the worst traits in human nature and to lend them a sort of sanctification.

There is a long and well-documented tradition of wisdom in the Christian faith that any venture into leadership, whether by laity or clergy, is hazardous. it is necessary that there be leaders, but woe to those who become leaders.

Evangelism is not a calling reserved exclusively for the clergy. I believe one of the greatest priorities of the church today is to mobilize the laity to do the work of evangelism.

It is through the close interaction of the laity and the monks that the essence of Zen penetrates social life.

That slavery had been sanctioned by God, as had the war itself, remained a bedrock position of the churches, the preachers, and the laity.

Among our own people also the church sorely needs clergy in close touch with the ordinary life of the laity, living the life of ordinary men, sharing their difficulties and understanding their trials by close personal experience.

One of the greatest priorities of the church today is to mobilize the laity to do the work of evangelism.

All professions are conspiracies against the laity.

A missionary church cannot rely on the professional ministry for the primary work of mission. The role of the laity is critical because it is the lay members of the church who have the greatest contact with those who are outside of the normal structures of church life. In such a situation the task of clergy is not so much to engage in mission themselves, as to support the laity in their mission.

I had him say: "I renounce any evil spirits of depression, and, in Jesus' name, I command them to leave." (Laity have authority over their own bodies and can command demons to leave them in Jesus' name).