The Other Catholics

[Apotheoun]

The link below is to an article on the Eastern Catholic Churches:

[url="http://crisismagazine.com/feature1.htm"][u]The Other Catholics: A Short Guide to the Eastern Catholic Churches[/u][/url]

[inDEED]

Dude...this link is a great resource! Thanks!

[MilesChristi]

Thanks for the article!

Which one of those Churches do you belong to, Apotheoun?

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='MilesChristi' date='Jul 8 2005, 09:28 AM']Thanks for the article!

Which one of those Churches do you belong to, Apotheoun?
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I belong to the Byzantine Catholic Church USA (Ruthenian).

[Brother Adam]

We're visiting a Byzaltine Cathoilc Church for our class (Theology of the Church)

"The Eastern Christian Churches" by Ronald Roberson is a good book.

[StColette]

Wow that was really awesome. I didn't know there were so many. I knew about the Coptic Catholic Church from reading about the Marian Apparitions in Egypt.

Anyway thanks for sharing this

[Didacus]

[quote name='Apotheoun' date='Jul 8 2005, 11:52 AM']I belong to the Byzantine Catholic Church USA (Ruthenian).
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[quote]14. The Byzantine Catholic Church USA (Rusyn - Ruthenian - Slovak)
Rite: Byzantine
Membership: 100,000

Many Ruthenian or Rusyn Catholics immigrated to North America. In 1891 and again in 1929, almost all returned to the Orthodox after experiencing strained relations with the Latin hierarchy and their imposition of clerical celibacy. Those who remained with the Catholic Church make up the Byzantine Catholic Church USA Metropolitate.

In 1999 William Cardinal Keeler of Baltimore apologized on behalf of the American Latin hierarchy for the inexcusable actions of Archbishop John Ireland of St. Paul, Minnesota, and others responsible for driving so many into what is now the Orthodox Church of America.
[/quote]

Tell me more... what's the story of Archbishop John of St.Paul?

How was this church founded?

And another question... as a Catholic, i can receive communion within any of these churches... but what if I wanted to leave the Latin church and join a different one? I suppose there is nothing wrong in doing this since my communion with the Catholic Church would not be broken... but does this happen often?

[jmjtina]

Whoa, that's alot!

Print. :pc:

and to think, I want to visit all those churches. It would be nice.

[zunshynn]

I love the other rites...

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='Didacus' date='Jul 8 2005, 11:45 AM']Tell me more... what's the story of Archbishop John of St.Paul?
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Archbishop John Ireland refused to recognize the legitimate right of the Byzantine Catholics in his diocese to their own theological and liturgical traditions and tried to force them to become Latin Catholics. He also made it hard for the clergy of the Eastern Churches to function in his diocese. His persecution of the Eastern Catholics in his diocese, and in particular his refusal to accept Fr. Alexis Toth as pastor of a local Byzantine Catholic parish in Minnesota, led to a schism. Fr. Toth petitioned the Russian Orthodox bishop of San Francisco in order to become an Orthodox priest, and the Russian Orthodox bishop agreed and accepted him into the Russian Church. In 1891 Fr. Toth and the small parish that he was leading converted to Eastern Orthodoxy, and by his death in 1909, Fr. Toth had converted more than 20,000 Eastern Catholics to the Orthodox Church. Ultimately the bigotry of Archbishop John Ireland caused more than half of the Byzantine (Ruthenian) Catholics in the United States at that time to convert to Eastern Orthodoxy. Fr. Toth has been canonized as a saint by the Orthodox Church of America.

It took the Byzantine (Ruthenian) Catholic Church more than 20 years to recover from these events. Sadly in 1929 the Latin bishops of the United States caused a further schism in the Byzantine Ruthenian Church by insisting that all priests of the Byzantine Church had to be celibate. The Latin bishops appealed to the Vatican and Pope Pius XI issued a decree requiring that priests ordained in the Byzantine Church in America be celibate, basically outlawing married clergy. This decree led to the founding of the Carpatho-Russian Orthodox Church, and approximately half of all the Byzantine Catholics in the United States at the time converted to Eastern Orthodoxy.

The majority of the members of the Orthodox Church of America and the Carpatho-Russian Orthodox Church are descendants of Byzantine Catholics.

[Didacus]

I am very sadenned by what you told me.

I full heartingly join in the apology issued by William Cardinal Keeler of Baltimore in 1999, and extend this apology to you and your church now.

So if i understand correctly, the priests in your church are celibate?

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='Didacus' date='Jul 8 2005, 11:45 AM']How was this church founded?
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The Ruthenian Church is from the Transcarpathian region in Europe and came back into communion with Rome at the Union of Uzhorod in A.D. 1646. The first Ruthenian (Byzantine) Catholics began arriving in the United States in 1876, and slowly established the Byzantine Church in America.

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='Didacus' date='Jul 8 2005, 12:32 PM']So if i understand correctly, the priests in your church are celibate?
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Although the Papal decree of 1929 has not been officially rescinded, Eastern Catholic Churches, including the Byzantine (Ruthenian) Church, have begun ordaining married men to the priesthood. The Melkite and Ukrainian Churches do it rather regularly now, while the Ruthenian Church ordains married men on a case by case basis with the prior approval of Rome.

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='Didacus' date='Jul 8 2005, 11:45 AM']And another question... as a Catholic, i can receive communion within any of these churches...  but what if I wanted to leave the Latin church and join a different one?  I suppose there is nothing wrong in doing this since my communion with the Catholic Church would not be broken... but does this happen often?
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(1) Yes, a Catholic in a state of grace can receive communion in any Church that is in union with Rome.

(2) Yes, it is possible to change Churches. In order to change from the Latin Rite to an Eastern Rite a man must attend Divine Liturgy at an Eastern Catholic Church for about a year and a half to two years, and then at the end of that time, with the approval of the parish priest, he has to file an official petition to change rites with the local Eastern Catholic Eparch. The Eparch will then contact the man's Latin bishop in order to seek his approval of the transfer of ritual Church, if the Latin bishop refuses the Eparch can appeal to the Pope. But if the Latin bishop approves the change the Eparch simply issues a decree of transfer of ritual Church effective on a specific date. The man changing Churches has to sign the decree before it becomes effective. Finally, it is important to note that a man can only change his ritual Church once, and the change is canonically irreversible.

My own change from the Latin Rite Church to the Byzantine Ruthenian Catholic Church was effective 19 March 2005.

One other thing should be noted, the Holy See makes if very hard for an Eastern Catholic to become a member of the Latin Church, because there are only approximately 20 million Eastern Catholics worldwide. It is quite a bit easier for Latin Catholics to transfer to an Eastern Church.

[zunshynn]

Apotheon, would you be willing to share with us why you changed?

[Apotheoun]

[quote name='zunshynn' date='Jul 8 2005, 01:30 PM']Apotheon, would you be willing to share with us why you changed?
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A little over four years ago my theological views began to change after I started reading the writings of various Eastern Orthodox and Eastern Catholic theologians (e.g., Vladimir Lossky, George Papademetriou, Khaled Anatolios, John Meyendorff, et al.), and around that same time, I begun focusing more on the texts of the Eastern Church Fathers, and especially the writings of St. Maximos the Confessor, St. John Damascene, and St. Gregory Palamas.

Then in 2003 I began working on my MA in theology at Franciscan University of Steubenville, and because I was not all that interested in the Charismatic movement and didn't really like the way that the liturgy was celebrated on campus, I started going to the local Ruthenian Church with a Ukrainian Catholic friend from my dorm. After attending the Divine Liturgy for a while I realized that I felt at home in the Eastern Church.

I was attracted to the incarnational focus of Byzantine worship, with its recognition of the awesome power of the incarnation in bringing about the divinization of man. I was also attracted to the veneration of icons, and to the theology of divine energy which underlies that practice. Moreover, the beauty of the ritual of the Eastern Church, and what I felt to be the focus of all religious life in the East, that is, the focus upon experience of God, and not merely an intellectual experience, but an experience of God with the whole of my being, body, soul, and the living Spirit given to me in the sacraments, gave me a sense of peace that I had lacked before.

So, after attending Divine Liturgy for about a year and a half, I approached the pastor of the parish in order to see if I could canonically change rites. After a brief discussion, he approved of my decision and gave me the information I would need in order to file a petition for change of ritual Church. That petition was approved by the Archeparch of Pittsburgh and my transfer from the Latin Church to the Byzantine Church [i]sui juris[/i] took effect on 19 March 2005.

[Norseman82]

I also interviewed a Ukranian Catholic priest once for a college term paper. According to him, the St. Paul incident was a result of a Latin rite person seeing a married Eastern rite priest and raising a stink. In response, the Vatican would not allow eastern rite dioceses in the U.S. to ordain married men to the priesthood until recently. There were still married priests, but they were ordained for a diocese back in the Ukraine, not in the United States.

[Apotheoun]

Yes, the Latin Rite person was Archbishop John Ireland himself, and sadly his intolerance led to the exodus of more than half of the Eastern Catholics living in the United States at the time into the Orthodox Church. Archbishop Ireland was a man of his time period, and so his bigoted attitude was shared by many in the Latin Rite hierarchy in the United States, and that is one of the reasons why Cardinal Keeler apologized a few years ago for the Latin hierarchies actions at the end of the 19th century.

The Eastern Catholic Churches, based on the original agreements made between them and the Holy See, had the right to practice their own customs, and the fact that this was not respected is lamentable. Happily today the Holy See respects the rights of the Eastern Churches in communion with it, and moreover, it has come to understand that the only way it will be possible to restore communion with all the Eastern Churches is to recognize that the Catholic Church is not identical with the Latin Rite.

One other thing, it is interesting to note that Fr. Toth was a widower, because that fact shows just how deep seated the animosity of Archbishop Ireland was, that even an Eastern Catholic priest whose wife was dead, and who was living as a celibate priest, was unacceptable to him.

[FranciscanRocker25]

this is very interesting to me.

apotheoun-- do you know of any other valid sources that i could educate myself more on the eastern rite?

[DemonSlayer]

I went to a Melkite church once.