2.2. Various correlations between the forms of consecrated life and the episcopal ministry

The consecrated life is a complex reality, a charismatic reality that is lived and expressed in various forms of ministry. The great majority of persons belonging to the consecrated life are laymen or women (that is, they do not belong to the ordained ministry) and a minority are ordained ministries (in those groups defined juridically as “clerical institutes”). Some members of he episcopate come from the consecrated life. This is meant to say that – from the numerical point of view – the consecrated life belongs predominantly to the laity in the Church.

There are also among us a minority of institutes or consecrated persons who belong to the ordained ministry and we are clerics.

When we speak of correlation – within the ecclesiology of communion – it is important to keep in mind this difference, which has to be decisive for the configuration of the clerical form of the consecrated life and the ordained ministry of consecrated persons in the future. This is one aspect that should be approached in the Synod²².

There is a different correlation between the Bishops and the laity (including the members of institutes of brothers and sisters) and between the Bishops and the priests and deacons (among whom are ordained ministers who belong to the consecrated life). In the first instance the relationship is established from the hierarchical structure of the Church, which is differentiated due to the fact that there are clergy and laity; in the second case, because of their participation in the same ordained, sacramental ministry.