“Baptismal calling is at the heart of who we are as Christians. That
calling is manifested in a variety of ways, one of which is lay ministry.
On the one hand, some respondents see that carrying out the mission
of the Church is largely the responsibility of the clergy, while others
recognise a call for greater participation of lay people in the life of the
Church. Throughout the submissions, we heard similar calls that lay
people, should be involved in other more significant leadership and teaching roles … not just because it will take some burden off the priest, but because it is part of each person’s mission as a baptised Catholic.
“We need to learn from the past. There is recognition that we are a
Church in need of healing at every level and, as a survivor of abuse
who engaged in the process remarked, we need to find a forum in which
we can all heal together. In our process there has been a call to go deeper
and a recognition that the crisis in the Catholic Church in Ireland is,
in many ways, a crisis of faith. As Pope Emeritus Benedict XVI has
said: ‘Being Christian is not the result of an ethical choice or a lofty
idea but an encounter with an event, a person”.
Taken from the ‘Synthesis of the Consultation in Ireland for the Diocesan Stage of the Universal Synod 2021-2023’