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To avoid confusion, I must first make clear that this paper does not concern Catholic Action, the need for which is so stressed by the Hierarchy. Here we are left in no doubt as to What we should do. But I have often wondered when, why and how individual Catholics have been most active—what makes the difference between a preacher and a contemplative, and in what respects they are the same—and this represents the results of these wonderings.
What do we mean by an active Catholic? A complication arises at once, because there are obviously two sorts, both equally deserving of the name:
(a) The Catholic who spends his life in purposefully furthering Catholicism, usually by the spoken or written word; the missionary, of whom the great example is St. Paul. Him I will call the Professional Catholic, to distinguish him from
(b) the Living Catholic. He is not a preacher. He may be anything from a fisherman to an emperor, but his every thought, word and deed is vitally informed by his religion, which is the raison d’etre of his life. Of course, these divisions are not mutually exclusive. A good Professional Catholic can be, and indeed must be a Living Catholic, and a hitherto silent Living Catholic may start professing his faith at any time. Without irreverence, one can say that Jesus was a Living Catholic for thirty years, and a Professional one for three.
For the purpose of this paper, the term Active Catholic will mean what I have described as the Professional Catholic, as his work involves more definite physical action than that of the Living Catholic, whom we will dismiss with the comment that his state is that to which everyone without exception should aspire.
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- Copyright © 1945 Provincial Council of the English Province of the Order of Preachers