The article critically examines the relationship between clergy and laity by examining New Testament and early patristic sources, the practice in Protestant churches, and the theological grounding in the contemporary Catholic Church. The upheaval in the Corinthian church, as described by Clement of Rome at the end of the 1st century, is compared with similar phenomena in smaller Protestant churches, where the existing legal leadership is now being absorbed by representatives of charismatic spirituality. Whereas in Protestantism the understanding of ordained ministers as chosen members of the community has taken hold, in the Catholic understanding the source of legitimacy is primarily the words of Christ: “you have not chosen me, but I have chosen you,” as well as apostolic succession, the three-tier hierarchy and the sacramental nature of ordination. The almost exclusive method of appointing ministers in Protestant church formations is by election, which carries the danger of electing ministers according to one’s own wishes. The Catholic Church, at the initiative of the Second Vatican Council, implanted the originally Protestant concept of a universal priesthood of all believers. However, this has not only produced positive results, since the ontological sacramentality of priestly ordination is often obscured in the practical operation of participatory clergy and many liturgical excesses occur when lay people take on roles that do not belong to them. All this can be characterized as a clericalization of the laity, resulting from a loss of the sense of the sacramental character
of ordination.