The Lay Apostolate

(899) The initiative of lay Christians is necessary especially when the matter involves discovering or inventing the means for permeating social, political, and economic realities with the demands of Christian doctrine and life. This initiative is a normal element of the life of the Church: "Lay believers are in the front line of Church life; for them the Church is the animating principle of human society. Therefore, they in particular ought to have an ever-clearer consciousness not only of belonging to the Church, but of being the Church, that is to say, the community of the faithful on earth, under the leadership of the Pope, the common Head, and of the bishops in communion with him. They are the Church." (Pope Pius XII)

(900) Since, like all the faithful, lay Christians are entrusted by God with the apostolate by virtue of their Baptism and Confirmation, they have the right and duty, individually or grouped in associations, to work so that the divine message of salvation may be known and accepted by all men throughout the earth. This duty is the more pressing when it is only through them that men can hear the Gospel and know Christ. Their activity in ecclesial communities is so necessary that, for the most part, the apostolate of the pastors cannot be fully effective without it. (Catechism of the Catholic Church, 1997, #899-900)

Community & Public Education

Our third goal is "to educate the business and professional community about the leadership capability of educated, transformed criminals and the use of Catholic social teaching as a transformative tool" and what we do to accomplish this is to participate, through writing, speaking, and professional association memberships, in those venues that in some way will reach those communities.

Since our founding in 2003 David H. Lukenbill has been involved in the following ways:

1) September 2004: Spoke at the Criminal's & Gangmembers Anonymous prison/public forum at Mule Creek State Prison.

2) December 2006: First ebook, The Criminal's Search for God: Criminal Transformation, Catholic Social Teaching, Deep Knowledge Leadership, and Communal Reentry was published by Chulu Press. (Members Only)

3) March 2007: Authored the First Annual St. Dismas Feast Day Research Report: The LampStand Foundation's Mission: Terms Defined, Thesis Formulation, Policy Primer. (Members Only)

4) October 2007: Developed Guiding Principles for Criminal Justice.

5) October 2007: Became a member of the Society of Catholic Social Scientists and his article Catholic Social Teaching & Criminal Transformation is posted on their website at http://www.catholicsocialscientists.org/ .

6) November 2007: Became a member of the Fellowship of Catholic Scholars http://www.catholicscholars.org/ .

7) November 2007: Second ebook, Carceral World, Criminal City was published by Chulu Press. (Members Only)

8) January 2008: Paper, Criminal Reentry and Criminal Reformation was accepted for a panel presentation at the 2008 Conference of the Western Society of Criminology: "Social Justice: Informing Evidence-Based Policy & Planning" , http://www.sonoma.edu/ccjs/wsc/conference.htm

9) January 2008: Article, OD, The Natural Language of Human Service Nonprofits: Congruence and Opportunity, was published in Practicing the bi-monthly e-zine of the OD Network at http://www.odnetwork.org/publications/practicing/index.php

10) March 2008: Authored the Second Annual St. Dismas Feast Day Research Report: Catholic Social Teaching & Capital Punishment: A Tradition of Support. (Members Only)

11) May 2008: Authored the first LampStand Periodic Monograph: Capital Punishment & Matthew 18:6. (Members Only)

12) July 2008: Authored a review of the book: Criminal Justice and the Catholic Church, by Andrew Skotnicki (2007). The review was published by the Acton Institute in their Journal of Markets & Morality, Spring 2008 Issue. http://www.acton.org/publications/mandm/

13) August 2008: Accepted an appointment to the Sacramento Interagency Council to End Homelessness and will serve on the Criminal Justice Committee. http://www.communitycouncil.org/homelessplan/interagency.html