|
|
Article: Two churches: fixed menu or a la carte? (teachings of the Catholic Church)(Column)
- Article from:
- Commonweal
- Article date:
- January 31, 1997
- Author:
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1997 Commonweal Foundation. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
|
Last fall I wrote a speech for a college leadership conference on what it was like to be a layperson in the Catholic church for most of its history in this country. Perhaps I should have been prepared for the astonishment expressed at this reflection on the part of many of the audience. But it had not occurred to me that so many mature Catholics today do not know or remember a church in which the role of the laity was so minimal - to be a passive receiver of spiritual goods and services, on the one hand, and to support the good works of clergy and religious, on the other.
In a 1979 essay for the collection Why Catholic? compiled by John J. Delaney for Doubleday, I ...