Rites Of The Church

[Ziggamafu]

Hey, I stumbled onto this link and discovered more rites than I was previously aware of - I didn't know there was more than one Western rite:

[url="http://www.agapebiblestudy.com/charts/CATHOLIC_RITES.htm"]http://www.agapebiblestudy.com/charts/CATHOLIC_RITES.htm[/url]

[b][u]WESTERN RITES[/u][/b]

LATIN RITES:
-Roman
-Ambrosian
-Gallican

NON-LATIN RITES:
-Mozarabic
-Italo-Greek

***

[u][b]EASTERN RITES[/b][/u]

BYZANTINE RITES
-Albanian
-Belarussian
-Bulgarian

ANTIOCHENE RITES
-Maronite
-Syrian
-Syro-Malankara

CHALDEAN RITES
-Chaldean
-Syro-Malabar

[Slappo]

Before Apo jumps in,
The rites listed are all fully in line with the Holy Father and don't include the Orthodox rites according to the site.

Although I have some Byzantine Catholic friends and one is Ukrainian and the other Greek? Maybe those aren't fully united but some are...

[CatherineM]

About half the Ukrainian churches here are Catholic and the other half are Orthodox. Lots of Ukrainians here.

[Slappo]

[quote name='CatherineM' post='1787297' date='Feb 21 2009, 09:37 AM']About half the Ukrainian churches here are Catholic and the other half are Orthodox. Lots of Ukrainians here.[/quote]


I bet that's what it is then, they only have the Byzantine rites that are fully Catholic with no orthodox listed. So there's really even more Catholic rites then that .

[Apotheoun]

Eastern Catholics belong to self-governing Churches and not merely rites.

[Apotheoun]

Below is a post -- of an internet acquaintance of mine -- that explains the difference between a "Church" and a "rite."

[quote][size=3]The term "Eastern Rite" gets bandied about quite a bit here and I think the time has come to explain the distinction between "Rite" and "Church". Unfortunately, the two are sometimes used incorrectly by Eastern and Oriental Catholics, as well as by Latin Catholics.

For centuries, Eastern and Oriental Catholics were referred to by their Western brothers and sisters as "Eastern Rite Catholics". One who was a member of a particular religious group within Eastern or Oriental Catholicity was spoken of as being of the ____ Rite (e.g., Melkite, Ruthenian, Ukrainian) - with the concept being that each was a Rite within the Latin Church (e.g., the Ambrosian Rite). Several years ago, Rome finally recognized that what had been termed "Rites", when applied to those of the East and Orient, were actually separate Churches, which together with the Latin Church, constitute the Catholic Church.

Thus, the Catholic Church is comprised of 23 self-governing Churches, also referred to as Churches sui iuris ("Churches of their own law"), also sometimes as Particular Churches or Autonomous Ritual Churches.

Correct usage of the term "Rite" is important, more so in the Eastern and Oriental Churches than in the Latin Church (although there are other Rites within the Latin Church, the Latin Rite vastly predominates in the West - the others are used only in very limited areas or under very particular circumstances).

Each Church sui iuris worships according to a particular Rite. A simple definition of a Rite is that it is the collected form of ritual, ceremony, and prayers according to which the members of a Church conduct their worship and other liturgical services; for the most part, Rites reflect the cultures in which they were developed.

Western Catholics use the Latin Rite (with a few exceptions, as I noted above). Eastern and Oriental Catholic Rites developed from the customs and style of worship practiced in what were the 3 most important centers of Christian development, other than Rome (i.e., Alexandria, Antioch, and Byzantium [later called Constantinople, and now Istanbul]). This happened at a time when achieving uniformity of liturgical practice was hampered by the limitations that resulted from geography and the difficulties of communication.

Initially, there were three Rites used by Eastern and Oriental Catholics: the Alexandrean, Antiochene, and Byzantine Rites. Eventually, as those Rites were carried back to other cities, modifications occurred. Three of the variations that arose developed in very isolated areas and, as a result, changed to such an extent that they came to be considered Rites unto themselves; those are the Armenian, Chaldean, and Maronite Rites.

In other instances, the changes which occurred in the Rites were less drastic and insufficient to merit being designated as a separate rite; such localized variations came to be termed "Traditions". Thus, the Antiochene Rite is further divided into the East and West Syrian Traditions. The Alexandrean Rite is comprised of the Coptic and Ge'ez Traditions. The Byzantine Rite, largest of the six Eastern and Oriental Rites (in terms of the number of Churches that use it), has both Byzantine-Greek and Byzantine-Slav Traditions.

The Armenian and Maronite Rites are each utilized only by a single Church sui iuris, so, within those two, there is no further breakdown by tradition. Although, historically, the Chaldean Rite was utilized by the Syro-Malabarese Catholic Church sui iuris, as well as by the Chaldeans, the present usage of the Malabarese is more closely aligned to the Antiochene Rite, for a variety of reasons. Thus, the Chaldean Rite presently can be said to be without any breakdown by tradition.

The Byzantine-Greek and Byzantine-Slav Traditions are each used by several Churches, with further local variations due to the ethno-cultural differences among the faithful of those Churches. Such variations are termed Recensions - thus, for example, there are Ruthenian and Great Russian Recensions (among others) within the Byzantine-Slav Tradition and Greek and Greico-Arabic Recensions (among others) within the Byzantine-Greek Tradition.

There are also rescensions within the East and West Syrian Traditions.

There is another breakdown, which is termed a Usage. This term hasn't really been applied to the Eastern and Oriental Churches historically (in the Latin Church, it is applied to the Anglican Usage, which is the ritual form and prayers permitted to be employed by certain congregations of faithful in the US who returned to communion with Rome from the Anglican or Episcopalian Church). However, there is presently one historical instance in an Oriental Church where it could probably be applied pretty aptly and another of recent vintage to which it might have application.

Within the Syro-Malabarese Catholic Church, there is a distinct group referred to as Southists or Knanaites. They are an endogenous community who are descendents of 72 Jewish Christian families who emigrated to Kerala on the Malabar coast of India in 352 AD, under the leadership of Knai Thomman (Thomas the Canaanite). Early in the 20th century, the Holy See granted the request of the Knanaites that a canonical jurisdiction be erected for them at Kottayam in Kerala Province (India) solely on the basis of their ethno-cultural identity. They have their own hierarch and clergy, subject to the presiding hierarch of the Syro-Malabarese Catholic Church, of which they are a constituent entity, while retaining certain liturgical practices unique to themselves. This is really a Usage and probably would have been termed such, except that there was no such terminology being employed back at the time they came into being. I suspect the term will ultimately be applied to them.

More recently, the election of a new Patriarch for the Chaldean Catholic Church brought to notice two very distinct factions within that Church's Synod of Bishops. They are commonly referred to as the Syriac (or Aramaic) and the Arabic parties. The former are dedicated to the Church's traditional liturgical forms; the latter is inclined to the arabization of the Church, critical to its efforts at prosletyizing, but feared both because it could diminish the Church's mission to its traditional base of Chaldean faithful and because it could damage the very fruitful dialogue and excellent relations between the Chaldeans and their counterparts of the Assyrian Churches. It is very possible that, ultimately, these will become 2 distinct Usages within the Chaldean Church.

The end result is that the term Rite is used differently within the Eastern/Oriental Churches and the Western Church. In the former, a single Rite is used either by a single Church or by multiple Churches - but never multiple Rites within a single Church; in the latter, a single Church uses multiple Rites.

I hope this is clear and not too confusing.

Many years,

Neil[/size][/quote]

[Ziggamafu]

Thanks for the info, Apotheoun. I am so, so ignorant of the Eastern churches. I am very eager to learn more, primarily as a result of your posts. It is an icky feeling regarding particular groups of Catholics as self-governing "churches" after I have, for so long, been a stickler about using the term "Church" in a strictly singular form.

Can you recommend three books for me on Eastern Catholicism? One as an easy-breezy intro, the second as a standard, intermediate text, and the third as the best contemporary treatment of the subject?

[Aloysius]

It is still accurate to use the term Church in a singular form. The Catholic Church is composed of 23 sui juris Churches, the Roman Church is the principal Church (principal meaning first, first among equal churches) which has as its patriarch the Pope of Rome, the successor of St. Peter whose ecumenical character guarantees the unity of the 23 churches within the Catholic Church. see? singular Church includes plural Churches...

[cmotherofpirl]

[quote name='Apotheoun' post='1787361' date='Feb 21 2009, 02:50 PM']Below is a post -- of an internet acquaintance of mine -- that explains the difference between a "Church" and a "rite."[/quote]
Is there a flow chart somewhere for this?

[Apotheoun]

The Catholic Church is actually comprised of 23 individual Catholic Churches, all with their own traditions, liturgies, and regulations. The Latin branch is so overwhelmingly large, however, that most Catholics do not know that these other branches exist. They include:

The Western (Latin) Liturgical Tradition:
1) The Latin Catholic Church

The Alexandrian Liturgical Tradition:
2) The Coptic Catholic Church (patriarchate) - Egypt
3) The Ethiopian Catholic Church (metropolia) - Ethiopia, Eritrea

The Antiochian (Antiochene or West-Syrian) Liturgical Tradition:
4) Maronite Church (patriarchate) - Lebanon, Cyprus, Jordan, Israel, Palestine, Egypt, Syria, Argentina, Brazil, United States, Australia, Canada, Mexico
5) Syriac Catholic Church (patriarchate) - Lebanon, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Palestine, Egypt, Sudan, Syria, Turkey, United States and Canada, Venezuela
6) Syro-Malankara Catholic Church (major archiepiscopate) - India, United States

The Armenian Liturgical Tradition:
7) Armenian Catholic Church (patriarchate) - Lebanon, Iran, Iraq, Egypt, Syria, Turkey, Jordan, Palestine, Ukraine, France, Greece, Latin America, Argentina, Romania, United States, Canada, Eastern Europe

The Chaldean or East Syrian liturgical tradition:
8) Chaldean Catholic Church (patriarchate) - Iraq, Iran, Lebanon, Egypt, Syria, Turkey, United States
9) Syro-Malabar Church (major archiepiscopate) - India, United States

The Byzantine (Constantinopolitan) liturgical tradition:
10) Albanian Byzantine Catholic Church (apostolic administration - Albania
11) Belarusian Greek Catholic Church (no established hierarchy at present) - Belarus
12) Bulgarian Greek Catholic Church (apostolic exarchate) - Bulgaria
13) Byzantine Church of the Eparchy of Križevci (an eparchy and an apostolic exarchate) - Croatia, Serbia and Montenegro
14) Greek Byzantine Catholic Church (two apostolic exarchates) - Greece, Turkey
15) Hungarian Greek Catholic Church (an eparchy and an apostolic exarchate) - Hungary
16) Italo-Albanian Catholic Church (two eparchies and a territorial abbacy) - Italy
17) Macedonian Greek Catholic Church (an apostolic exarchate) - Republic of Macedonia
18) Melkite Greek Catholic Church (patriarchate) - Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Israel, Jerusalem, Brazil, United States, Canada, Mexico, Iraq, Egypt and Sudan, Kuwait, Australia, Venezuela, Argentina
19) Romanian Church United with Rome, Greek-Catholic (major archiepiscopate) - Romania, United States
20) Russian Byzantine Catholic Church: (two apostolic exarchates, at present with no published hierarchs) - Russia, China; currently about 20 parishes and communities scattered around the world, including five in Russia itself, answering to bishops of other jurisdictions
21) Ruthenian Catholic Church (a sui juris metropolia, an eparchy, and an apostolic exarchate) - United States, Ukraine, Czech Republic
22) Slovak Greek Catholic Church (metropolia): Slovak Republic, Canada
23) Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church (major archiepiscopate) - Ukraine, Poland, United States, Canada, Great Britain, Australia, Germany and Scandinavia, France, Brazil, Argentina

Virtually all of the Eastern Catholic Churches are groups from the various Orthodox Churches which have since reunified (with the exception of the Maronites and the Italo-Albanians, which have always been in union).

FOR MORE DETAILED INFORMATION (and perhaps a few corrections) SEE THE THREAD AT CATHOLIC ANSWERS FORUM BELOW:

[url="http://forums.catholic.com/showthread.php?t=204252"][u]Eastern & Oriental Catholic Churches and Rites[/u][/url] by Irish Melkite

[cmotherofpirl]

[quote name='Apotheoun' post='1787664' date='Feb 21 2009, 11:39 PM']The Catholic Church is actually comprised of 23 individual Catholic Churches, all with their own traditions, liturgies, and regulations. The Latin branch is so overwhelmingly large, however, that most Catholics do not know that these other branches exist. They include:

The Western (Latin) Liturgical Tradition:
1) The Latin Catholic Church

The Alexandrian Liturgical Tradition:
2) The Coptic Catholic Church (patriarchate) - Egypt
3) The Ethiopian Catholic Church (metropolia) - Ethiopia, Eritrea

The Antiochian (Antiochene or West-Syrian) Liturgical Tradition:
4) Maronite Church (patriarchate) - Lebanon, Cyprus, Jordan, Israel, Palestine, Egypt, Syria, Argentina, Brazil, United States, Australia, Canada, Mexico
5) Syriac Catholic Church (patriarchate) - Lebanon, Iraq, Jordan, Kuwait, Palestine, Egypt, Sudan, Syria, Turkey, United States and Canada, Venezuela
6) Syro-Malankara Catholic Church (major archiepiscopate) - India, United States

The Armenian Liturgical Tradition:
7) Armenian Catholic Church (patriarchate) - Lebanon, Iran, Iraq, Egypt, Syria, Turkey, Jordan, Palestine, Ukraine, France, Greece, Latin America, Argentina, Romania, United States, Canada, Eastern Europe

The Chaldean or East Syrian liturgical tradition:
8) Chaldean Catholic Church (patriarchate) - Iraq, Iran, Lebanon, Egypt, Syria, Turkey, United States
9) Syro-Malabar Church (major archiepiscopate) - India, United States

The Byzantine (Constantinopolitan) liturgical tradition:
10) Albanian Byzantine Catholic Church (apostolic administration - Albania
11) Belarusian Greek Catholic Church (no established hierarchy at present) - Belarus
12) Bulgarian Greek Catholic Church (apostolic exarchate) - Bulgaria
13) Byzantine Church of the Eparchy of Križevci (an eparchy and an apostolic exarchate) - Croatia, Serbia and Montenegro
14) Greek Byzantine Catholic Church (two apostolic exarchates) - Greece, Turkey
15) Hungarian Greek Catholic Church (an eparchy and an apostolic exarchate) - Hungary
16) Italo-Albanian Catholic Church (two eparchies and a territorial abbacy) - Italy
17) Macedonian Greek Catholic Church (an apostolic exarchate) - Republic of Macedonia
18) Melkite Greek Catholic Church (patriarchate) - Syria, Lebanon, Jordan, Israel, Jerusalem, Brazil, United States, Canada, Mexico, Iraq, Egypt and Sudan, Kuwait, Australia, Venezuela, Argentina
19) Romanian Church United with Rome, Greek-Catholic (major archiepiscopate) - Romania, United States
20) Russian Byzantine Catholic Church: (two apostolic exarchates, at present with no published hierarchs) - Russia, China; currently about 20 parishes and communities scattered around the world, including five in Russia itself, answering to bishops of other jurisdictions
21) Ruthenian Catholic Church (a sui juris metropolia, an eparchy, and an apostolic exarchate) - United States, Ukraine, Czech Republic
22) Slovak Greek Catholic Church (metropolia): Slovak Republic, Canada
23) Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church (major archiepiscopate) - Ukraine, Poland, United States, Canada, Great Britain, Australia, Germany and Scandinavia, France, Brazil, Argentina

Virtually all of the Eastern Catholic Churches are groups from the various Orthodox Churches which have since reunified (with the exception of the Maronites and the Italo-Albanians, which have always been in union).

FOR MORE DETAILED INFORMATION (and perhaps a few corrections) SEE THE THREAD AT CATHOLIC ANSWERS FORUM BELOW:

[url="http://forums.catholic.com/showthread.php?t=204252"][u]Eastern & Oriental Catholic Churches and Rites[/u][/url] by Irish Melkite[/quote]
Can you explain the difference between archiepiscopate, patriarchate, and exarchate please.

[Maximilianus]

[quote name='cmotherofpirl' post='1787606' date='Feb 21 2009, 10:02 PM']Is there a flow chart somewhere for this?[/quote]

>> [url="http://www.nativityukr.org/who_we_are/rites_chart2.html"]Chart of Catholic Rites[/url]