Focusing on the role of the laity

You can impact the next generation of lay Catholic leaders for civil society and you can hear about it from the founder of the organization with that very mission.

“This is the time for the laity to embrace their faith and bring it into the culture,” Most Reverend Thomas J. Olmsted, Bishop Emeritus of Phoenix said. “I think we need to recognize God’s providence brought us to this time. It is not an accident; He knows what He is doing.”

It is a message the retired bishop will bring to the Cathedral of the Holy Spirit on Thursday, April 11 at 7 p.m.  The free event is hosted by the Knights of Columbus and arranged through Tepeyac Leadership Inc. (TLI). Father Dominic Bouck, master of ceremonies, Cristofer Pereyra, CEO of TLI, and Monica Hannan KFYR-TV News Anchor and TLI board member, will also give short talks.

It was in the Phoenix Diocese, through the combined inspiration of Bishop Olmstead and Cristofer Pereyra, that TLI began. Their mission is to challenge and equip the laity to take on leadership roles to influence the culture and serve the common good.

Bishop Olmstead became known to many through his 2015 document, Into the Breach: An Apostolic Exhortation to Catholic Men, in which he issued a challenge to men to step into the breach. He identified the crisis of faith facing the Church today and presented a vision of the role of Catholic men for combating it.

According to John Berger, Grand Knight of the Cathedral of the Holy Spirit Council, “Many Knights of Columbus councils across the United States and the world have been significantly and positively impacted by Into the Breach.” The Knights based a video series on it and then followed up with another one titled Mission of the Family. 

“Bishop Olmsted’s challenge for men to live up to the vocation they have received —as husbands and as fathers—has been impactful on many fronts,” Berger said. “Meeting in small groups to watch the series and then discuss it has helped build relationships among Catholic men and create an awareness of the great spiritual battle raging around us. As one of the episodes discussed in detail, ‘iron sharpens iron’ and we men need to not only challenge one another to live our calling as the spiritual leaders of our families but help one another make it a reality.”

Hour of the laity

Although Bishop Olmstead said he may touch briefly on his Into the Breach message, he will primarily be addressing both men and women during his talk to focus on their role as Catholics in the world.

“This is the time for laity to embrace their faith and bring it into the culture,” he said. “It’s always been the case that we are involved in a spiritual battle—Peter’s Epistle made that clear—but our culture today, in many ways, is especially being weakened spiritually.”

Thus, according to him, we need to be well-formed in our faith and willing to live it out in the world and stand against the spiritual pressures of today.

Bishop Olmstead explained the inspiration to establish TLI began after he hired Pereyra to work with their Hispanic mission office. “We were focused on the millennials [the generation ages 28-43] because so many of them were not going to church. But then we realized that it’s not just Hispanic millennials, but all millennials. The two of us felt that a mission to the laity was something badly needed. If we are going to impact the culture, we need the witness of the laity.”

Bishop Olmstead noted that millennials were the age group also missing on boards of directors for organizations. “We asked, ‘What is happening here? Where are the young leaders?’ We worked to get more adults to have the basic formation of the faith because we knew the only way to be a good witness is to really know your faith. From among them, more young people were encouraged to be a part of it and the numbers grew.”

TLI developed out of this initiative as its own program and has a five-month (18 weekly sessions) leadership program for the development of Catholic professionals and the advancement of the mission of the Church. The program educates participants in the core teachings of the Church and their concrete application to the career world.

“We want Catholics to be living their faith where they are among their peers and in their professions,” Bishop Olmstead said. “The laity are more than 99% of the Church. The primary role for Catholic leaders is not just to do what father needs at church, but for leadership in the world especially in board rooms where a lot of decisions are made. We want our Catholic laity to think about helping to engage others in society where they can have an impact. Priests and deacons are not lay people. For instance, who is the best influence on a lawyer living his faith? Another lawyer.”

Living the mission

Monica Hannan came to be a TLI board member as her own life became influenced by their mission. “I considered my faith to be a private matter,” she said. “That was probably cemented in place by my chosen profession as a journalist. I took great pains to be neutral in all things.”

Several years ago, seeking a deeper faith experience, Hannan earned a master’s in theology at the Augustine Institute.  

“Out of the blue I was contacted by Cristofer Pereyra, CEO and President of Tepeyac Leadership, Inc.,” she explained. “He initially wanted me to teach a class to TLI attendees on modern media and he asked me to join the TLI board of directors. When I told him of my attempts to seek a faith-related job, his response surprised me. He told me I was needed right where I was because the world needs committed Catholics working in the secular world. Now, I believe he is right.”

Formation in the faith is a key element, according to Hannan. “I believe it’s difficult to deeply study the roots of the Catholic/Christian faith and not be convinced of the truth of it,” she said. “The formation offered by TLI does that for young people who are just starting out in their careers. Once there’s a true understanding, it’s natural to want to do what Christ charged Christians to do—to evangelize in the way they live and in the work they do.”

To learn more about the global Catholic apostolate, Tepeyac Leadership, Inc., go to tliprogram.org. All are invited to the April 11 event. There will be a reception following Bishop Olmsted’s talk.