The Intermountain Catholic. (Salt Lake City [Utah] ;) 1899-1920, 1903-11-21
THE LAY APosToLATE.

Priests engaged in giving missions to
non-Catholics have discovered that the
laity must cooperate with the clergy
| to obtain the best results. A priest
writing in the Missionary has this to
say on the subject:
Missions and missionaries may do
much, but the seed must be sown For
this important work no hand can equSl
that of the right hand of a Catholic
| layman. A missionary has said: Give
us an earnest, jealous. Catholic laity,
whose lives are above reproach. and
America is as good as converted Our
little experience would lead to like
conclusion. In our first mission field
live four Catholic families. For years
they had discussed religion with their
separated brethren and had distributed
a limited amount of controversial liter
ature. On leaving that field we had an
inquiry class of twenty-eight; next
place, one Catholic family-an inquiry
class of nine; third place, one Catholic
family. considerably removed from
place of meeting, result: an inquiry
class of two; last meeting, DO Catholics,
result: though many We're interested,
and we circulated much reading matter,
no inquirers at all
Another priest declares in the same
magazine that the laity have an impOr-
tant work to do as coadjutors of the
parish clergy. He gives his own very
interesting experience in these words:
Il picked out three of the jealous
young women; I could have had more,
but l thought three enough for the ex-
pertinent. I showed them the field and
told them what could be done with it.
l asked them to make, list of their
nom Catholic acquaintance in their
frr,I,
brought into frequent contact, and in
struct them themselves till they led
them to conviction, and then to bring
them to me- 1 also told them that there
are many adults and working boys and
girls, Catholics born and baptized who
have been neglected through one reason
or another, and have never made a con-
fession nor their first communion l
told them that they could prepare such
better than the pastor, because such
are ashamed to come to the priest, and
fear to be put on the level of little chill
dren in a catechism class. My three
apostles were working women, and aft
er their hard days labor they spent
their evenings looking. for the lost
sheep. 1t was a thickly populated
parish and they had no trouble in find
ing them. They organized catechism
structed, Individually, those who were
ashamed to come to catechism class.
They were enthusiastic apostles, and
felt for the first time in their lives that
they We're really working for their
neighbours salvation.
"They worked for two months and
brought the fruit; eight converts and
forty-five adults for first communion.
Some of these were married and had
never made their first confessions; some
We're old enough to marry; many of
them were Italians and Bohemians,
who were under no parochial influence
Or, rather, who had not responded to
the ordinary parochial influences. The
laborers have only touched the rim of
the field. and are still at work reaping
harvest for Cod
Who is the man or woman, priest or
layman, who will organize the work of
lay parish missionaries? The laity can
reach crowds of people a priest cannot
possibly reach; they can carry the gos-
pei into places into which priest could
never find entrance; they can attract
souls, bad Catholics and n-Catholics,
the great unchurched mass of outsiders,
by methods peculiarly their own. A
permanent band of lay visitors who
should call on every soul in the parish
could reap so great harvest that l
will pray every day till it be realized;
and there are thousands of earnest, pru-
dent and jealous persons ready for the
asking