UNITED KINGDOM
Crux
By Jack Valero
Special to Crux June 3, 2016
A new front Pope Francis has opened in his bid to reform the Catholic Church may prove one of his toughest challenges yet. But it is also, unquestionably, one of the most important.
“I remember now the famous expression, ‘It is the hour of the laity’,” he said in a recent letter to the Pontifical Commission for Latin America, “but it seems that the clock has stopped.”
A resurgence of clericalism, he warned, is stifling the possibility of lay people taking up their proper role in the Church – one of the key insights of the Second Vatican Council.
This isn’t a side issue for Francis; unless lay people assume responsibility for mission and evangelization, he says in the letter, “the prophetic fire that the Church is called to light in the hearts of her peoples will be extinguished.”
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