Laity and Development

The essence of integral development is such that all people have access to economic, social, political, cultural and spiritual resources to enable them to meet individual and societal needs. To be sustainable, integral development requires the participation of various actors of development working together. Among these actors is the church which complements the efforts of the state, civil society and private sector through the promotion of the spiritual aspect of development. However, the Catholic Church has for a long time emphasised spirituality at the expense of the socio-economic aspect of development while at the same time remaining heavily dependent on foreign aid, particularly from Europe and the United States of America. With outside funding dwindling away, the church through the laity has no choice but to promote self-development, that is, development from within. As this book shows, plans, programmes and projects for integral development took shape in the 1980s in Bukoba Diocese, Tanzania. The role played by the Kolping Society of Tanzania, the Union of Catholic Women in Tanzania (WAWATA) and the AIDS Control Programme is commendable. But this is just the beginning.