What does it mean to be lay faithful today? The deepest identity of lay Christians is to be found through three relationships:

a) The person of Christ. This is the very heart of our Christian identity. Pope Benedict XVI wrote in Deus Caritas Est: “Being Christian is not the result of an ethical choice or a lofty idea, but the encounter with an event, a person, which gives life a new horizon and a decisive direction” (no. 1). He went on to say: “The real novelty of the New Testament lies not so much in new ideas as in the figure of Christ himself, who gives flesh and blood to those concepts—an unprecedented realism” (no. 12). To be a Christian is truly a real vocation. The Master always calls us by name and says “Follow me!”. Christians are grafted to Christ like branches to a vine through the sacrament of Baptism. They receive the gift of “newness of life” and are “new creatures”. This amazing change allows us to say with the Apostle: “No longer I, but Christ who lives in me” (Gal 2: 20). Thus they are called to be witnesses in the world to this “newness of life”.

b) The Church. A Christian is never alone and isolated. Christians are born into a large community and live together with “an extensive company of friends” (Benedict XVI), the Church.  This community cannot be seen simply from the human and sociological point of view. Its origin and essence is supernatural. The Church is an “organic communion” in which there coexist a diversity and complementarity of vocations, ministries, services, tasks and responsibilities. Rather than conflict there is reciprocity and coordination” (cf. Christifideles Laici, no. 20-21). The Church therefore has the form of trinitarian communion. That is why none of the lay faithful should be simply passive observers. Each one is responsible for the special mission entrusted to them by Christ. The Second Vatican Council strongly emphasises that “the apostolate of the laity derives from their Christian vocation and the Church can never be without it” (Apostolicam actuositatem, n.1). This explains the need for active and responsible participation by the laity in their Church community. They must assume their responsibility towards the Church and their mission in the world.

c) The world. The Second Vatican Council clearly indicates what it is that distinguishes the lay faithful from other states of life in the Church. It is their special relationship with the world, the so-called “secular character”. “The laity, by their very vocation, seek the kingdom of God by engaging in temporal affairs and by ordering them according to the plan of God. They live in the world, that is, in each and in all of the secular professions and occupations. They live in the ordinary circumstances of family and social life from which the very web of their existence is woven. They are called there by God so that by exercising their proper function and led by the spirit of the Gospel they may work for the sanctification of the world from within as a leaven. In this way they may make Christ known to others, especially by the testimony of a life resplendent in faith, hope and charity” (Lumen Gentium, no. 31). This secular character gives a special stamp to the apostolate of the lay faithful, and also to their spirituality and their path to holiness. The lay faithful do not escape from the world. They are called to become holy while living in the world. This means that there is an important pastoral challenge. How can the lay faithful be helped to defend their identity as “Christians immersed in the world”? There are temptations to become “clericalised” or to flee from the world (examples are: convenient flight into intimism, disembodied spirituality, or closure within intra-Church affairs and forgetting the missionary dimension). Let us read again what was said in the ancient “Letter to Diognetes”: “They live in the flesh, but they are not governed by the desires of the flesh. They pass their days upon earth, but they are citizens of heaven /.../ To speak in general terms, we may say that the Christian is to the world what the soul is to the body. As the soul is present in every part of the body, while remaining distinct from it, so Christians are found in all the cities of the world, but cannot be identified with the world”. The author concludes by saying: “Such is the Christians’ lofty and divinely appointed function, from which they are not permitted to excuse themselves”.