The term »layman« was used by Jews in Christ’s time. And that’s how the term »layman« became a part of Christianity. Throughout history priesthood had a higher position than laymen. Luter and other reformists responded – Luter was against priesthood superiority. In 1946, Pope Pius XII said that the laymen are the Church. Later, the church documents defined who the laymen are. The laymen are all believers except the holy order and priesthood but they all are equal in dignity.
Cooperation between priest and laymen can happen on different areas: municipal, social, religious… Pastorale can be divided in three main fields: announcing, worshipping and serving. The product of these three fields is the fourth one, the religious community. Each field has special jobs. Catechist, animators, scouts, members of marital and biblical group are jobs of announcing religion. Jobs of worship are readers, church singers, altar boys, part-time givers of communion, conductor and the organist. Servers are caretakers, secretary in parochial office, charitable workers, members of economic council and members of parochial pastorale council. Members of religious community are decorators and cleaners, parochial housekeeper and vestry worker. I have presented each parochial field in depth and included work of individual fields in the parish Maribor – Tezno. At the end I added my experiences that I got over the years of working in the Church.
|