Sharing our Life

Lay Passionists

In recent years, lay men and women in the Church have joyfully embraced new opportunities to engage in the Church’s mission, bringing with them a variety of talents and skills in service of God and community.

For the Passionists of St. Patrick’s Province, the call for increased lay participation, and our warm welcome to those who are answering that call, has resulted in an evolving bond of spirit and friendship that is energizing, hopeful and transformative to lay and professed Passionists alike.

The Passionists extend this call to laity in a variety of ways, e.g. 

• Partnership in Ministry

All the people of God share in the universal call to ministry. In our Passionist parishes and other centres we acknowledge this by inviting the laity to collaborate in the saving work of Christ as responsible and active participants. We acknowledge a responsibility to encourage and support the formation and growth of God’s people that they might engage as fully as possible in a variety of forms of ministry, utilize their gifts and resources, and give witness to Christ. 

• Passionist Companions

Passionist Companions are lay associates who seek the enrichment both of themselves and of their members through a deepening understanding and engagement with Passionist Spirituality and with the charism of St. Paul of the Cross, which they then try to live out in their daily lives. Meeting monthly, usually in one of our Passionist houses, they seek to be strengthened and supported by sharing with like-minded people. 

• Passionist Family Groups

Passionist Family Groups is a parish based movement that seeks to build Christian community through the development of extended families. With loneliness and isolation so prevalent in our society, they meet a need for people to know and support each other. Family Groups create an extended family atmosphere within the parish community and are open to everyone, married or not. Its focus is on people caring for, loving and accepting each other just as they are and, in so doing, building up the Christian community. 

• Passion Prayer

Passionists proclaim God’s love for the world revealed through the Passion of Jesus Christ. We keep alive the memory of Christ’s Passion through our service to those who suffer. Remembering the Cross means remembering those in the world who bear the Cross today: the disabled, the sick, the dying, the grieving, the impoverished, the spiritually bereft, those isolated and alone — all who bear a burden of pain. Our communities are schools of prayer where you can learn the art of uniting yourself with our Crucified Lord and with the crucified of the world today in prayerful contemplation.