Lay and ordained ministry

Abstract

In the centuries immediately before Vatican II, the ordained priesthood was understood to be the exclusive locus of ministry in the Catholic Church. Since the Council, things have changed dra matically, and in some parts of the world there has developed a paid 'professional' lay ministry. This is most obvious in parishes in the United States and in German-speaking countries, and that development is clearly connected to the fact that these are well resourced Churches with a shortage of priests. That said, the phenomenon of catechists in the developing world demonstrates that lay ministry has a universal importance. While the flowering of lay ministries in various and diverse forms has clearly enriched ecclesial life across the Catholic world, this has not been without tension and sometimes conflict, and part of the reason has been a lack of theological clarity and consensus about the nature of min istry itself and about the relationship between lay and ordained ministries.