Your RCIA team’s number-one job

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4 thoughts on “Your RCIA team’s number-one job”

  1. Angela Hibbard, IHM

    I think I first understood that the “pyramid” vision of the Church was wrong when i was working with an inquirer. The catechetical leaflet I was using explained the ministries by starting at the top and coming ondown to the laity, so I drew the pyramid on a piece of paper and then the inquirer and I added in the ministerial roles in their proper places. But I made sure that we added the laity I(and the catechumens, who were in the Church but not yet fully initiated). But it felt wrong to me. So I asked the inquirer to imagine that the “pyramid” was viewed “from the air,” so to speak. When you look down on a pyramid, it looks like a circle with concentric rings. Clearly there are more laity than clergy, and they are no more or less important than the smaller group of ministers. This diagram has problems too, but it works better than the pyramid.

  2. This message is so timely. I still read articles and statements that imply that the “church” is an institution ,

    The “church” is identified with the clergy, people in religious life and perhaps some prominent lay leaders.

    People “join” the church.

    But perhaps we should say that we “become” the church when we are baptized. We are all the church and we need to act as if we believe this.

  3. Vince Brandolini

    Let us not forget that they ARE at the top, as far as authority goes. They rightly exercise that authority for the benefit of the People of God, but nonetheless they have that authority:

    “Extraordinary gifts are not to be sought after… but judgment as to their genuinity and proper use belongs to those who are appointed leaders in the Church, to whose special competence it belongs, not indeed to extinguish the Spirit, but to test all things and hold fast to that which is good.”

  4. There are two attributes which I see to be the great highlight of the common priesthood of the baptized. These two characteristics are also constantly under challenge, and threat of worldliness, and even avoidance.
    These are the notions of personal responsibility and individual accountability.

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