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Empowered as King, Priest and Prophet: The Identity of Roman Catholic Laity in the People of God
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 01 January 2024
Abstract
The language of “People of God,” which exemplifies the radical shift in ecclesiology found in the documents of the Second Vatican Council, not only has gained a predominance of use in contemporary Roman Catholic theology, it provides a vocabulary with which to explore the identity of the Roman Catholic laity, particularly as they relate to the scripturally-grounded titles of “King,” “Priest,” and “Prophet.” This article considers the implications of this identity in contrast to the Institutional ecclesiology with which it competes in the conciliar documents as well as in many official statements since Vatican II. Viewing these titles from their roots in Hebrew and Christian Scripture opens new avenues of empowerment for the laity and for transforming the whole Church.
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References
1 Lumen Gentium, no. 32. I am using Flannery, Austin O.P., ed., Vatican Council II: The Conciliar and Post Conciliar Documents, new revised ed. (Grand Rapids, Michigan: William B. Eerdmans Publishing Co., 1992)Google Scholar. Hereafter Lumen Gentium will be referred to as LG.
2 Ibid.
3 Ibid., no. 30; emphasis added.
4 This includes official documents as well as theological works. Indeed, the vocabulary of the People of God is found often in liturgical music and prayer as well.
5 This idea is interspersed throughout chapter 2 of Lumen Gentium, and is continued in other documents, for example in Nostra Aetate.
6 As it will be shown later, unfortunately some early Christian writers saw Christianity replacing Israel as the “new” People of God, an understanding that is subject to increasing criticism in light of post Vatican II Jewish-Christian dialog. This issue will be considered later in this paper.
7 Harrington, Daniel, “Why is the Church the People of God?,” in Vatican II: The Unfinished Agenda, eds. Richard, Lucien, Harrington, Daniel and O'Malley, John (New York/Mahway: Paulist Press, 1987), p. 48.Google Scholar
8 By “enemies” here, it is intended to mean those individuals [e.g., Sadducees and Pharisees] who, being threatened by Jesus’ preaching, conspired to put him to death, not the Jewish faith nor the Jewish population at large. It is to be assumed throughout this paper that historically Jesus did not desire to begin a new religious tradition, but like the prophets before him, to reform those elements within his tradition that went against what God intended for the Chosen People.
9 1 Pet 2:9–10. All biblical quotes are taken from the NAB, unless quoted by a secondary source.
10 Harrington, “Why is the Church the People of God?,” p. 52. In the replacement view, the Christian community has replaced Israel as the People of God.
11 LG, no. 16.
12 Howard Clark Kee, Who are the People of God: Early Christian Models of Community (New Haven and London: Yale University Press, 1992), p. 99.
13 It should be understood, of course, that Israel's covenant with God is modeled on the notion of a “vassal covenant.”
14 Gaillardetz, Richard, Teaching with Authority: A Theology of the Magisterium in the Church (Collegeville, Minnesota: The Liturgical Press, 1997), p. 19Google Scholar.
15 The idea that baptism constitutes membership into the People of God can be traced back to Christianity's Jewish roots as well. Several years ago, Monika Hellwig wrote a nice piece on Christian baptism in relation to the ancient Israelite's baptism rite:Israel has, though the ages, baptized converts who have come from among the nations seeking membership in Israel as the People of God. In such a baptism, the newcomer recapitulates in his person, in a dramatic reenactment, the sacred history of Israel. He is immersed bodily in waters symbolizing the primeval chaos, the flood-time wickedness of men, the bondage of Egypt, and the river Jordan that bars the way to the promised land. Symbolically, he goes through the passage from death to life which the people have made so many times. … By passing through the waters in the ceremony he also accepts the conditions of the Sinai Covenant in addition to those of the covenant God made with Noah. The Meaning of the Sacraments (Ohio: Pflaum Press, 1981), p.8Google Scholar.
16 LG, no. 36.
17 Alberigo, Giuseppe, “The People of God in the Experience of Faith,” in La Iglesia Popular: Between Fear and Hope, ed. Boff, Leonardo and Elizondo, Virgil (Edinburgh: T. & T. Clark, Ltd., 1984), pp. 29–30Google Scholar.
18 Alberigo uses the group, “Catholic Action” to illustrate this point:
“Catholic Action as a form of collaboration in the hierarchical apostolate was the reassertion of the total dependence of any lay movement on the clerical caste: lay people were accepted as indispensable collaborators from the moment when the shortage of vocations meant that the clergy could no longer be self-sufficient, and from the moment when society seemed to refuse to give ever greater devotion to and place ever greater trust in the clerical habit. … Catholic action is not guiding action in the theoretical sphere, but an executive branch in the practical sphere. So action became widely seen as the way, virtually the only way open to lay people, of expressing their Christian fervour.” Ibid., 29.
19 Osborne, Kenan, Priesthood: A History of the Ordained Ministry in the Roman Catholic Church (New York/Mahwah, N.J: Paulist Press,1988), p. 83Google Scholar.
20 Note that I have intentionally changed the language here from “Jesus” to “Christ” – indicating the change in Christology from a more ascending approach where all Christians represent Jesus in both his humanity and his divinity, to a decidedly descending approach that is characteristic of the type of theology where only those in exalted positions represent Jesus in his exalted state, as Lord over all.
21 See Osborne's discussion in Priesthood on the movement of ordained ministry understood as service to ordination as power which found official articulation in Trent (see ch.9) and the retrieval of the language of ministry as service in the documents of Vatican II (ch.11).
22 LG, no.10.
23 LG, no.18. The divinely-ordained nature of the hierarchy is asserted at the onset of ch.3 of the section on the People of God, prior to discussion of the laity.
24 See, e.g., J. Pleins, David, The Social Visions of the Hebrew Bible, (Louisville, KY: Westminster John Knox Press, 2000), p. 285Google Scholar.
25 For example, this condemnation is particularly sharp in Hosea 4:4–19.
26 Gaillardetz, Teaching with Authority, p. 227.
27 Ibid., 235.