2014 Year of the Laity

The 120-strong Catholic Bishops’ Conference of the Philippines (CBCP) has declared 2014 as the Year of the Laity as it cites the need for social transformation amid what it calls as “systemic corruption” that destroys the country’s political and economic landscapes.

In a pastoral exhortation, “Filipino Catholic Laity: Called to be Saints…Sent Forth as Heroes,” the bishops stressed the need to empower the laity as it urges the faithful to “unite in groups, which through prayer, discernment and concerted action, will renew the social and political fabric of our country.”

“Individual goodness is not sufficient anymore. The good individual will only be swallowed up by the evil system. While individual witness is important, it is in unity that good Christian people will get their strength and attain victory,” the prelates said in a CBCP News post.

“It is certainly a shameful proof of our failure to evangelize our country that our churches are filled with people, our religious festivities are fervent, our Catholic schools are many, but our country is mired in poverty and in corruption. Many, perhaps the majority of the corrupt people in politics and in business are graduates of our own Catholicschools and are practicing Catholics. The majority of those who cheat in elections and those who sell their votes are also baptized Catholics. This is also true of the bribe takers in public offices and the looters of our public coffers,” it added.

The bishops cited the importance of strengthening and living one’s faith through reading the Scriptures, seeking recourse to the sacraments, and contributing to the mission of new evangelization even through simple means. “It is only through an integral faith that systemic concerns hounding the country may be resolved. Make your faith bear on your day to day decisions and activities,” they said.

The CBCP, likewise, lauded the faith, resilience, and great display of dignity shown by Filipinos in the face of the recent devastating calamities.

“The first and most important truth about the Filipino Catholic laity is not poverty but the greatness of their dignity. Thisdignity derives from God’s unmerited choice of you to belong to God’s holy people,” it said.

Year 2014: Laity

This year especially celebrates both the sacrament of Baptism by which all the faithful become God’s sons and daughters and the sacrament of Confirmation by which they become witnesses of Christ to others. Yet the gifts of the Holy Spirit through these sacraments often remain dormant. This year is to be devoted to the renewal of the laity, to their “empowerment” or more accurately to activating their charisms from the Spirit, so that they may indeed take up their role as co-responsible agents of evangelization and lead in the task of social transformation. In this regard, of paramount global importance is the ecological challenge of climate change