The publication of Magnifica humanitas offers a particularly timely opportunity to return to a question that, in my view, remains decisive for the life of the Church in emerging countries: the proper place of the lay faithful in the ecclesial mission. This is not merely an organizational issue, nor simply a discussion about the distribution of tasks within the Christian community. It concerns something deeper: understanding where the Christian vocation of the layperson is ordinarily fulfilled, and how that vocation can contribute to the transformation of social realities marked by precarity, inequality, informality, institutional fragility, and weakened community ties.

The thesis I wish to propose is the following: the participation of the lay faithful in the mission of the Church must develop from their professional activity; it is there that this participation finds its proper and distinctive mode of realization. This statement does not reduce Christian life to work, nor does it disregard the importance of prayer and the sacraments: the source of Christian action always comes from a personal relationship with the Lord. What I wish to clarify is that the layperson does not participate in the mission of the Church primarily by substituting for ecclesiastical functions, nor only by taking part in apostolic initiatives or volunteer work, but through the sanctification of the temporal realities in which he or she lives and works.

This idea stands in direct continuity with Lumen gentium. The Second Vatican Council states that “by their very vocation, it belongs to the laity to seek the Kingdom of God by engaging in temporal affairs and ordering them according to the plan of God.” It adds that laypeople live in the ordinary conditions of family and social life, and that they are called to contribute to the sanctification of the world “from within,” like leaven, by carrying out their own profession under the guidance of the Gospel spirit (Lumen gentium, n. 31). This doctrine is far-reaching. It does not present the world as a space external to the Christian mission, but as the place where the lay faithful are called to make Christ present through their work, their decisions, their relationships, their civic responsibility, and their participation in the building of society.

From this perspective, Magnifica humanitas allows us to take a further step. The encyclical states that it seeks to help, “above all,” the lay faithful and all people of good will to rediscover their task of making present in everyday life — in family relationships, work, and social participation — the principles of the Church’s social doctrine, allowing themselves to be moved by the purpose of embodying the love of God in the concrete fabric of history (Magnifica humanitas, n. 47). This statement prevents us from understanding closeness to God as a spiritual life parallel to professional responsibility. If the love of God must be embodied in the concrete fabric of history, then the spiritual life of the layperson cannot remain confined to devotional, liturgical, or intra-ecclesial spaces. It must also be expressed in the way one works, leads, hires, teaches, researches, produces, serves, innovates, decides, and cares for the social consequences of one’s own activity.

As an academic and researcher in the business world who lives in an emerging country, I often observe that this understanding has not yet fully unfolded all its consequences. In some ecclesial contexts in emerging countries, there seems to have been a partial reception of Lumen gentium and Christifideles laici. Without intending to do so, this partial reception can lead to identifying the participation of the layperson in the mission of the Church almost exclusively with internal tasks within the ecclesial community: liturgical services, pastoral activities, volunteer work, movements, parish groups, or direct collaboration with ecclesiastical structures. All these tasks are valuable and, in many cases, necessary. However, if they occupy the center of the understanding of the lay vocation, they can push into the background the place where the proper mission of the layperson is ordinarily at stake: the family, work, business, culture, politics, education, the economy, social relationships, and territorial life.

The pastoral and spiritual risk, then, is the production of two parallel lives. On the one hand, there is a religious life, made up of practices of piety, ecclesial belonging, and community participation. On the other, there is a secular, professional, and social life, which develops according to its own criteria and is often disconnected from faith. Christifideles laici warns precisely against this fracture. It states that in the life of the lay faithful “there cannot be two parallel lives”: a spiritual life and a secular life made up of family, work, social relationships, political commitment, and culture. The document adds that all the fields of lay life are the “historical place” where the charity of Jesus Christ is revealed and realized for the glory of the Father and in service to one’s brothers and sisters. In this context, it explicitly mentions professional competence, solidarity at work, family life, social and political service, and the proposal of truth in the field of culture as providential occasions for the exercise of faith, hope, and charity (Christifideles laici, n. 59).

This statement has a demanding consequence. The spirituality of the layperson is not verified only in his or her interior life, but also in the moral, professional, and social quality of ordinary action. It is not enough for a believer to be a pious person if his or her work is negligent, disordered, technically mediocre, unjust, or indifferent to its consequences for others. Closeness to God must shape the way one works. It must be expressed in responsibility, study, competence, honesty, effort, punctuality, respect for persons, a sense of justice, and genuine concern for the common good.

Here the message of Saint Josemaría Escrivá on the sanctification of work becomes especially forceful. In Conversations, Saint Josemaría states that God calls us to serve him “in and from the civil, material, and secular activities of human life”: in the laboratory, the operating room of a hospital, the barracks, the university lecture hall, the factory, the workshop, the fields, the family home, and the vast panorama of work. He adds that there is “something holy, something divine, hidden in the most ordinary situations, and it is up to each one of you to discover it” (Conversations, n. 114). This teaching should not be read as a generic invitation to find spiritual consolation in ordinary life. It has a more radical consequence: if God awaits us in work, then work must be treated with professional seriousness, with real love for persons, and with responsibility for its social effects.

For this reason, the sanctification of work requires work to be well done. This is not a secondary demand. Christifideles laici states that the lay faithful must carry out their work “with professional competence, with human honesty, with a Christian spirit,” as a path of their own sanctification. It also recalls that through work, human beings provide for their own life and that of their family, are joined to their brothers and sisters, serve them, practice true charity, and cooperate in the perfecting of divine creation (Christifideles laici, n. 43). Charity does not replace competence. Good intentions do not dispense one from study. Social sensitivity does not replace technical quality. The sanctification of work requires human perfection: doing things well, even “better than the best,” not out of professional vanity, but because Christian service requires real quality.

This idea is especially important in emerging countries. In societies marked by high levels of precarity, professional work has a direct social function. It is not only a means of personal fulfillment or family support. It is also a path for creating capabilities, improving institutions, ordering processes, raising standards, generating trust, forming people, opening opportunities, and promoting more humane living conditions. In these contexts, poorly done work is not merely a technical defect: it can aggravate precarity, feed distrust, weaken institutions, and frustrate opportunities for development.

Magnifica humanitas offers a solid basis for this reading. The encyclical recalls that work is the “essential key” to understanding the social question, because in work the person develops central dimensions of his or her existence (Magnifica humanitas, n. 148). For this reason, work cannot be treated as a mere economic instrument: it expresses and increases human dignity, and it constitutes an ordinary path of maturity, development, and personal fulfillment (Magnifica humanitas, n. 149). Where work is degraded, family, culture, social trust, and the possibility of a truly human life are also weakened.

Precisely for this reason, the sanctification of work is linked to subsidiarity. If work is an area in which the person unfolds his or her dignity and contributes to the common good, the person should not be replaced in what he or she can responsibly carry out. Magnifica humanitas recalls that subsidiarity requires that what can be done by persons, families, local communities, and intermediate bodies should not be absorbed by higher authorities; rather, these higher authorities must recognize, protect, and promote the freedom and creativity of the lower levels (Magnifica humanitas, n. 68). Applied to the mission of the lay faithful, this means that the Church must promote an adult, competent, and responsible lay presence in temporal realities. The layperson should not wait for pastoral directives in order to act in the world; he or she must assume Christian responsibility wherever he or she has knowledge, experience, professional authority, and a concrete capacity for service.

This also requires us to rethink lay formation. If the proper vocation of the layperson is realized in temporal realities, Christian formation should not be limited to devotional or intra-ecclesial content. It must help form the conscience, practical intelligence, and social responsibility of the believer. It must insist that work be carried out with human perfection. It must prepare laypeople to act as Christians in business, the university, public administration, research, culture, education, the rural world, technology, the liberal professions, and social organizations.

Christian life requires prayer and the sacraments, but also study, social doctrine, professional ethics, technical competence, discernment, capacity for dialogue, diligence, and commitment to the common good. Christifideles laici recalls that laypeople must be formed to live the unity proper to who they are: at once members of the Church and citizens of human society. It adds that integral formation must include, in addition to spiritual and doctrinal formation, professional competence, civic sense, probity, a spirit of justice, sincerity, and strength of character (Christifideles laici, nn. 59-60).

In an emerging country, this formation is urgent. It is not enough to have laypeople available to collaborate in ecclesial activities. We need laypeople who stand out professionally; laypeople capable of creating dignified employment, leading companies with a human sense, educating with rigor, researching the real problems of the country, participating in public life with integrity, strengthening institutions, promoting territorial cooperation, raising the quality of services, and generating innovations that arise from local knowledge. There, an essential part of the Church’s mission is at stake. There, it becomes clear whether the Christian faith is truly capable of illuminating social life.

For this reason, perfection in work should not be understood as perfectionism. It is a concrete form of charity. A physician serves better when he studies and updates his knowledge. A professor serves better when he prepares his classes and knows his students. A public official serves better when he decides with justice and does not allow himself to be captured by particular interests. A farmer serves better when he improves his productive practices and cares for the land. The quality of work is a condition of Christian justice and charity.

Consequently, the place of the lay faithful in the ecclesial mission in emerging countries must be recovered from its proper source: the sanctification of professional activity and of temporal realities. The ecclesial participation of the layperson cannot be reduced to internal activities of the Church, however valuable they may be. This perspective allows us to understand more deeply the message of Magnifica humanitas. The encyclical does not simply invite us to use technology well or to protect human dignity in the face of artificial intelligence. It invites us to safeguard what is human amid historical transformations. For the layperson, this safeguarding ordinarily takes place in professional work. There one discovers whether faith has reached intelligence, will, decisions, habits, competence, responsibility, and service. There one sees whether Christian life is a unity between the spiritual and the secular.

We may conclude, therefore, that in emerging and socially precarious countries, the sanctification of work is neither a spiritual luxury nor a doctrine reserved for professional elites. It is an ecclesial and social necessity. If that work is directed toward transforming the concrete conditions of the territory, recognizing local capabilities, and promoting more humane forms of development, then what Saint Josemaría invited us to discover becomes visible: “something holy, something divine, hidden in the most ordinary situations,” which is not found apart from reality, but precisely in the task of ordering it according to God.

References

Second Vatican Council. Lumen gentium, especially n. 31.

John Paul II. Christifideles laici, especially nn. 43, 59, and 60.

Leo XIV. Magnifica humanitas, especially nn. 47, 68, 148-149, and 181.

Saint Josemaría Escrivá. Conversations, n. 114.