Editing Laity (section)

===Catholic Church===
{{main|Catholic laity}}
The [[Second Vatican Council]] (1962–1965) devoted its decree on the apostolate of the laity ''Apostolicam actuositatem''<ref name="Catholic laity">[https://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_decree_19651118_apostolicam-actuositatem_en.html "Apostolicam actuositatem"] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150625142206/https://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_decree_19651118_apostolicam-actuositatem_en.html |date=2015-06-25 }}. Vatican.va. Retrieved on 2013-12-15.</ref> and chapter IV of its dogmatic constitution ''[[Lumen gentium]]'' to the laity in a sense narrower than that which is normal in the [[Catholic Church]]. The normal definition of laity is that given in the [[Canon law#Catholic Church|Code of Canon Law]]:
{{Blockquote|By divine institution, there are among the Christian faithful in the Church sacred ministers who in law are also called clerics; the other members of the Christian faithful are called lay persons.

There are members of the Christian faithful from both these groups who, through the profession of the evangelical counsels by means of vows or other sacred bonds recognized and sanctioned by the Church, are consecrated to God in their own special way and contribute to the salvific mission of the Church; although their state does not belong to the hierarchical structure of the Church, it nevertheless belongs to its life and holiness.<ref>[https://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG1104/__PT.HTM Code of Canon Law, canon 207] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200312112835/http://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG1104/__PT.HTM |date=2020-03-12 }}. Vatican.va. Retrieved on 2013-12-15.</ref>}}

The narrower sense in which the Second Vatican Council gave instruction concerning the laity is as follows: 
{{Blockquote|The term laity is here understood to mean all the faithful except those in holy orders and those in the state of religious life specially approved by the Church. These faithful are by baptism made one body with Christ and are constituted among the People of God; they are in their own way made sharers in the priestly, prophetical, and kingly functions of Christ; and they carry out for their own part the mission of the whole Christian people in the Church and in the world.<ref name=LG31>[https://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_const_19641121_lumen-gentium_en.html "Lumen gentium", 31] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140906031754/https://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_const_19641121_lumen-gentium_en.html |date=2014-09-06 }}. Vatican.va. Retrieved on 2013-12-15.</ref>}}

In this narrower sense, the Council taught that the laity's specific character is secularity: they are Christians who live the life of Christ in the world. Their role is to sanctify the created world by directing it to become more Christian in its structures and systems: "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".<ref name=LG31/> The laity are full members of the Church, fully share in Church's purpose of sanctification, of "inner union of men with God",<ref>[https://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__P27.HTM Catechism of the Catholic Church, 775] {{Webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20200308075851/http://www.vatican.va/archive/ENG0015/__P27.HTM |date=2020-03-08 }}. Vatican.va.</ref> acting with freedom and personal responsibility and not as mere agents of the hierarchy. Due to their [[baptism]], they are members of God's family, the Church, and they grow in intimate union with God, "in" and "by means" of the world. It is not a matter of departing from the world as the monks and the nuns do that they sanctify themselves; it is precisely through the material world sanctified by the coming of the God made flesh, i.e. made material, that they reach God. Doctors, mothers of a family, farmers, bank tellers, drivers, by doing their jobs in the world with a Christian spirit are already extending the Kingdom of God. According to the repeated statements of Popes and lay Catholic leaders, the laity should say "we are the Church," in the same way that the saints said that "Christ lives in me."<ref>{{cite web|url=http://blessedsacramentregina.ca/non-integration-mass-ministries/|title=THE ROLE OF LAITY|website=blessedsacramentregina.ca|date=4 May 2014 |access-date=2015-01-07|archive-date=2015-01-08|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150108010356/http://blessedsacramentregina.ca/non-integration-mass-ministries/|url-status=live}}</ref>

Lay involvement takes diverse forms, including participation in the life of the parish, [[confraternity|confraternities]], [[lay apostolate]]s, [[secular institute]]s, and [[Roman Catholic lay ecclesial movement|lay ecclesial movements]]. There are also [[lay ecclesial ministry|lay ecclesiastical ministries]], and where there is a [[priest shortage]], lay people have to take on some functions previously performed by priests.

====Vatican II afterwards====
{{See also|Theology of Pope Francis#Clericalism}} 
In December 1977, "A Chicago Declaration of Christian Concern" was published. The declaration looked back a decade to the Vatican Council II with appreciation for its "compelling vision of lay Christians in society." As the Declaration interpreted it, the Council viewed the laity's "special vocation" as being the "leaven" for the "sanctification of the world" in their "secular professions and occupations". However, lamented the Declaration, the council's vision has "all but vanished" from the church.

The Declaration was signed by forty-seven clergy, religious, and laity that included men and women in many occupations, and it served as the charter for the National Center for the Laity (NCL).<ref name="catholiclabor.org">{{Cite web |url=http://www.catholiclabor.org/NCL%20Inititiative/A%20Chicago%20Declaration.pdf |title=Archived copy |access-date=2015-01-08 |archive-date=2016-02-21 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20160221092829/http://www.catholiclabor.org/NCL%20Inititiative/A%20Chicago%20Declaration.pdf |url-status=dead }}</ref> The NCL helps lay Catholics respond to their call to change the world through their daily activities and regular responsibilities,<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.catholicreview.org/article/work/working-families/national-center-marks-30-years-of-helping-catholic-laity.|title=Catholic Review - Archdiocese of Baltimore}}</ref> and it publishes a monthly online newsletter ''Initiatives: In Support of Christians in the World.''<ref>{{cite web |url=http://www.catholiclabor.org/NCL.htm |title= Initiatives: In Support of Christians in the World|website=www.catholiclabor.org |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150109004343/http://www.catholiclabor.org/NCL.htm |archive-date=2015-01-09}}</ref>

''Initiatives: In Support of Christians in the World'' (January 2015) rejoiced that "50 Years since Vatican II" the increased [[lay ministry]] in parishes has "brought fresh vitality". However, the newsletter lamented "the neglect of formation for the lay apostolate in the world".

Pope Francis is quoted as confirming this lament. Priests tend to "clericalize the laity" and view their ministry as only "within the Church," discounting their "workaday" ministry.<ref name="ReferenceA">{{Cite web |url=http://www.catholiclabor.org/NCL%20Inititiative/Jan%2015.pdf |title=Archived copy |access-date=2015-01-08 |archive-date=2015-01-09 |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20150109003248/http://www.catholiclabor.org/NCL%20Inititiative/Jan%2015.pdf |url-status=dead }}</ref> From the start of his papacy Francis called for structural change in the Church which will foster the responsibility of the laity now held "at the edge of the decisions" by &nbsp;"excessive clericalism", and to "create still broader opportunities for a more incisive female presence in the Church". The "missionary transformation of the Church" is seen by some as "the goal of this pontificate",<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://www.asianews.it/news-en/Pope:-A-missionary-and-pastoral-conversion-for-a-Church-open-to-changing-its-structures-29645.html|title=Pope: "A missionary and pastoral conversion" for a Church open to changing its structures|last=Pisano|first=Franco|date=November 26, 2013|website=www.asianews.it|access-date=2019-12-30|archive-date=2019-09-25|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20190925125919/http://www.asianews.it/news-en/Pope:-A-missionary-and-pastoral-conversion-for-a-Church-open-to-changing-its-structures-29645.html|url-status=live}}</ref> with all the baptized becoming "missionary disciples",<ref>{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=0PGODwAAQBAJ&q=We+cannot+demand+that+peoples+of+every+continent%2C+in+expressing+their+Christian+faith%2C+imitate+modes+of+expression+which+European+nations+developed+at+a+particular+moment+of+their+history&pg=PT167|title=Go Forth: Toward a Community of Missionary Disciples|last=Francis|first=Pope|date=2019-06-26|publisher=Orbis Books|isbn=978-1-60833-787-3|language=en|access-date=2020-10-18|archive-date=2021-04-29|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210429004835/https://books.google.com/books?id=0PGODwAAQBAJ&q=We+cannot+demand+that+peoples+of+every+continent%2C+in+expressing+their+Christian+faith%2C+imitate+modes+of+expression+which+European+nations+developed+at+a+particular+moment+of+their+history&pg=PT167|url-status=live}}</ref><ref>{{Cite book|url=https://books.google.com/books?id=69m7DgAAQBAJ&q=pope+francis+and+the+missionary+impulse&pg=PA130|title=Pope Francis and the Future of Catholicism: Evangelii Gaudium and the Papal Agenda|last=Mannion|first=Gerard|date=2017-04-24|publisher=Cambridge University Press|isbn=978-1-108-13274-9|language=en|access-date=2020-10-18|archive-date=2021-04-29|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20210429003054/https://books.google.com/books?id=69m7DgAAQBAJ&q=pope+francis+and+the+missionary+impulse&pg=PA130|url-status=live}}</ref>