These groups—Opus Dei, People of Praise, Focolare, Communion and Liberation, are organizations of Christians sharing and doing their Christian things. Opus Dei is the most well known due to its age and impact, and, in distortion, thanks to Hollywood, and now People of Praise is in the news because a Supreme Court candidate in the running is a member.
Do the Catholic or Protestant Churches have a name for this type of organization?
How tightly are they affiliated with the recognized hierarchies of their parent, larger faith communities? For the sake of argument, I’ll posit that named positioning within Catholic hierarchy is the gold standard, down to anybody’s Church Sunday gatherings, and exclude Left Handed Harley Davidson Riders for Christ and the like.
In Catholicism, such groups would be called “lay organizations.”
I imagine the same would be true among Protestant groups, although in some Protestant circles, the line between clergy and laity is rather thin indeed, and they reject the term “lay.”
I don’t think they have a name in United Methodism other than simply ‘organization’ or ‘group’ or ‘club,’ possibly ‘movement.’ To be honest, United Methodists don’t typically go in for such things anyway and they tend to be hyper-focused when they exist. I guess in our church, we have ‘Circle of Friends’ which is an interdenominational group that feeds the homeless on weekends when the shelters don’t. We have another non-denominational ‘Winter Weather Posse’ which goes around and seals up homes and does fall maintenance for the elderly and disabled in the community. There’s another one in the summer which is a different group, but does the same thing. We have a group that raises money for the UN World Food Programme. We have one that prepares Thanksgiving meals for the homeless and shut-ins. My wife started one that does games and daycare for parents in the park on weekends to get children active and give their parents time to themselves or to run errands or work when the daycares are closed. I don’t think that these are what you’re talking about though. Even though these are laic groups that exist without any clerical oversight and raise most of the funds themselves, they still don’t seem what you’re really after. I can’t think of a broad-reaching United Methodist "We’re striving to be Holy.’ organization in the vein of Opus Dei, nor could I imagine what it would be called. I think that such a group would likely just be called ‘different’ or ‘interesting’ preceded by a brief pause as in, ‘That group is… interesting.’
I look forward to the continuation of this thread, but let me interrupt here to say I didn’t know this–and it no doubt has many many sources in doctrine–and find it fascinating.
Opus Dei does have lay members, but it is not strictly a lay organization; it does include priests as members. Conversely, there are organizations such as the Teams of Our Lady where priests are present as “advisors” to the actual members, who must always be laypeople, or the Tertiary Orders where again and by definition the members are always laypeople.
Some denominations use the terms “deaconate/diaconate” for continuing service organizations made up of lay people. But the definition of who or what is a deacon can be pretty flexible.