Here is a quote from he April 2006 Initiatives Newsletter:
“If you happen to be a layperson who is serious about faith, chances are the church will enlist you to teach Sunday school, serve on a committee or lead worship. "Ministry" happens within the bounds of the congregation or denomination (the "church gathered," as R. Paul Stevens from Regent College terms it). Little attention is invested in the "church dispersed." Rarely is daily work recognized as ministry.
Rare, too, is the teaching that all work is service to God.”
The quote is taken from an article by by Wally Kroeker in Our Faith, a journal sharing previously published materials from a Mennonite/Anabaptist perspective. It struck me as absolutely true of Catholics.
Initiatives goes on with a quote from Russell Shaw:
Vatican II, says Russell Shaw, “made it overwhelming clear” that a lay person’s responsibility “is primarily [an] apostolate that carries the gospel out into the world.” Yet since Vatican II, lay ministry inside the Church has received most of the emphasis. Internal “lay ministry is a good thing,” says Shaw, author of Catholic Laity in the Mission of the Church (Requiem Press [2005], PO Box 7, Bethune, SC 29009; $14.95). But lay ministry within a Church organization is not the same thing as the Christian’s “right and duty to participate in the mission of the church,” on the job, around the home and in the neighborhood.
When we hear the words of the dismissal at the end of Mass “go in peace to love and serve the Lord” we return to our lay ministry. Our real service is as part of the “church dispersed” to use Steven’s term.
Why do few, if any, Catholics reply “Thanks be to God” and leave mass looking forward to returning their real ministry of service on Monday morning? Author Gregory Pierce says "if we get the dismissal right we will get the mission right." (Click here for his talk on CD.)
Most parishioners leaving Mass on Sunday morning believing that they are going to provide service to someone during the coming week. They do not, however, see that service in terms of the mission of the church. They know they are providing service, if only because someone values it enough to pay them for it. Yet they have the impression that the only real ministry is the unpaid service done within or for the Church. Why this impression? In his book, Spirituality@Work Pierce offers some reasons and gives some spiritual disciplines that we can practice in order to live up to the charge given at the dismissal. (Click here for my review.)
What could change the prevailing attitude that real ministry takes place inside the church? Maybe the Bishops, pastors, liturgists and church staff could be encouraged to think about the “dismissal ratio”. This ration might, for example, be the number of baptized and confirmed adults who leave church divided by the number of full time staff in the parish. Our parish has 1070 households. Lets assume that we have 2140 adults leave mass every Sunday and that we have 10 full time staff equivalents. This would give us a dismissal ratio of 214 (2140/10). This number is not precise – it does not need to be. It simply makes the point that for every parishioner dismissed for internal service to the parish there are over 200 dismissed for service to the world – in one capacity or another.
From this perspective the pastor and ten staff members are overhead – their ministry is to help the 2140 parishioners be more effective in the service they provide to world during the week.
The Initiatives newsletter calls for suggestions on how the liturgy and parish staff might do this. One idea is to put this sign on the exit to the church: “Service begins here. Let us go forth in joy to love and serve the Lord.” Recognition in the form of bulletin announcements, bulletin boards and during homilies would also highlight the aspect of service.
Any other suggestions?
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