www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life The Christian East & West Encyclical Allatae Sunt

Latincat having read your posts, what is your point? You came on the forum making some very broad statements of what it was in your view BCC people believed. Are you here to instruct us in the faith?

LatinCat,

Congratulations, you know something about the Eastern Rite Catholic Churches!

That know puts you in the statistical 1% of Roman Catholics who do know something about the ECC's.

This is called 'cat and mouse.' It is not something that is earning you any credibility or respect.

IF you came here to prove that all eastern Catholics are bigots, please step back. I am here to tell you on the authority of my own experiences, they are not.

IF you are here to prove that Latin rite Catholics are superior beings without blemish, please step back. I am here to tell you on the authority of my own experience, they are not.

Invert both of the above and the results will be the same, so keep that in mind before you shoot off a response.

Now if you want to stop playing head games then you might find that you don't know as much as you think you do, but you may also find that what you DO know will be helpful and useful to others here.

You can present your observations and opinions but you cannot jam them down anyone's throat. If the latter is what you are here for, then please step back.

You have presented nothing here so far but attitude, yet you expect respect for what you know. We don't know what you know. But we surely do recognize a very very familiar attitude.

You might take that with you when you step back. Nobody here needs or wants more of it than we already have.

Eli

Aside from the above-cited attitudinal issues about the superiority of the Roman Rite (which was disavowed by Vatican II), this document has a lot of good commands in it it that were clearly disobeyed by Archbishop John Ireland when he refused to grant faculties to Fr. Alexei Toth, and when he lobbied for the suppression of married clergy amongst the Greek Catholics in America. Was Ireland ignorant or willful? I also wonder how many Latin-Rite Catholics are aware of the schisms provoked in the U.S. by the likes of Abp. Ireland. As a former Latin Rite Catholic, I can affirm that the answer to that question is "precious few".

Deacon Robert

Granting that we, Latins, have not fared well (i.e., at a level acceptable to our Eastern brethren) in educating ourselves on the rich liturgical patrimony of the East, even after "Orientale Lumen," it is not right to put the blame entirely on us.

The Latin Church in the U.S. was/is, likewise, in a state of influx: from the fruits of "battling" and "re-evangelizing" Protestantism in its various stripes to "integrating" immigrants from Europe, Asia, Africa, and Hispanic America. Amidst the clatter of differing and different cultures and languages, the U.S. Catholic hierarchy might have lost, or losing, sight of the Eastern Catholic minorities within the fold.

This does not mean to justify the admitted and recognized fault of the Bishop Irelands of the world but we ask our Eastern Catholic brothers to concede some slack. This unfortunate event is not to be repeated again given the active involvement of the USCCB nowadays, under which Eastern Catholic bishops are integral.

And a proposed alternative: why not exert efforts to educate us?

Amado

Amado,

Here is how I see it. Our little 60 family church in Florida has special events once in a while (Slavic Feast, etc...). We have tried on more than once to get the local RC's to help advertise our events (I am sorry I am laughing right now).

Here is another example, the RC diocese website list all the "Catholic" Churches. Where is our Church listed?

Here is another example, we can't rent the kitchen of the RC that is less than a mile away without lots of red tape. Ok... aren't we the same Church?

Here is another example, we tried to have a special "Mass" for Pro-Life events. Only one RC showed up.

Here is another exmaple, when I try to organize a Pro-Life event with the local RC Churches I have to try to convence them we are Catholic (I don't think they believe me).

I could go on an on but I think you get the idea.


RCIA should have a mandatory 1 hour presentation of the ECC's. That might solve our problems.

When EVERY head is plugged to overflow with self-pity, where's the room for knowledge?

Eli

Eli,

It's not self-pity. I am tired of trying with these people (RC's). If we can't work together (i.e. Pro-Life events) then we might as well as close shop.

It's sinful how some RC's act toward us.

Eastern Catholic Superiority Complex. I guess that is the way you roll. No need to get futher involved with such nonsense on your part. I have read the documents of the east from Vatican II and His Holiness Pope John Paul II. I have read about eastern catholic beliefs. I even considered switching to the east at one point because it was so beautiful. But then I saw the anti-Roman attidtude in the east my mind was made up that the west was the place to stay for me. You guys continually presuppose that Roman Catholics are ignorant (perhaps some of you are angry ex-latins, i don't know) and this has happened throughout this thread. When I point this out, it has nothing to do with head games, however your claim that it does is a nice way to dodge the issue, now isn't it?

This is my opinion. I feel strongly that we should simply give them some "holy competition". Instead of deferring to the RC's in various areas because we are on "their turf", just go out and grow our Church by bringing in whoever we can. When we realize some level of success, they will have to take notice. Again, my opinion, but I also think that the Eastern Catholic Bishops in the U.S. should, as a group, when the situation demands it, issue statements critical of those American Latin-Rite bishops who stray from the Faith, or who foster or tolerate dissent against received Catholic teaching (such as the case with those dissenting catechetical conferences in Los Angeles). This should be done, first, for the protection of our Faithful who may be so unfortunate as to live geographically within the environs of a Latin-Rite diocese governed by a neo-modernist or dissenting bishop, and ,secondly, for the benefit and protection of all of the Catholic Faithful, since every bishop is consecrated for the whole Church. How is that for stirring up a "hornet's nest"?

Dn. Robert

RayS:

The RC diocese in your area is not obligated to list your parish in its website, unless it has been placed under its RC bishop?

The Latin Church, among all the Churches in the Catholic communion, has been in the forefront of the Pro-Life movement all these years.

I am fairly certain the RC Church is the majority among the Catholic Churches in your area. They should take the lead, and accept it, and not vice versa. You can contribute a large contingent of Eastern Catholics if you so desire.

Why try to organize your own when there is already an existing one? Is the Pro-Life movement organized and led by the Latins not doing its job?

A Catholic is a Catholic is a Catholic! How many time have we heard this?

Show your true colors!

Amado

The Archdiocese of Los Angeles does list the Eastern Rite Churches and once in a while does have a story or two in the offical newspaper...I'm surprising myself with a positive thought...amazing...

Though I think that more can be done...however there are many things happening within the Latin Rite especially in the U.S., I hope and pray the dust settles quickly and the Light of the East will be shared by many...

PAX
james

I admit that was a double pronged barb, and it applies to me as well. Sometimes more than most in fact. Doesn't hurt to give a little extra and then a little more. You know what I mean. I'll quit preachin', for a while

Eli

If you point it out once, twice, three, maybe four times...Ok.

But when it is ALL that you point out each and every time you bother to write to the Forum, then it becomes your problem, a very personal problem, I will add. It's not even related to anyone's triumphalism but your own.

This one is your's kid, all your own attitude, and if you've got nothing else to talk about, well then, we'll understand your limitations and make room for them. God bless and keep you, son.

Eli

I happen to be a former Latin-Rite Catholic, and a Deacon in the Byzantine Catholic Eparchy of Passaic. I'm going to give a very good example of the level of ignorance that I personally have encountered from even good-willed Latin Rite Catholics. Our current parish had a parochial school which, interestingly, merged with about eight Latin Rite schools to form an academy. The academy has the practice of holding a "family Mass" every month, on a Saturday evening, at one of the participating parishes. One month, recently, it was our turn to host a Divine Liturgy for the school kids and their parents. After the Divine Liturgy was over, one of the mothers came up to me and said "how wonderful it is that the school is exposing the kids to other religions". I tried to explain to her, to no avail, that we were also "Catholic", and that this was not another "religion". In that same academy, we had an IHM nun as teacher who was trying to train our Byzantine kids to cross themselves the "right way". She went so far as to state to one of our students, whom she tried to get to cross himself the "right way" that "you people aren't really Catholic, anyway". The student to whom she made that statement is now a priestly candidate for the Orthodox Church in America at St. Tikhon's Orthodox Seminary in So. Canaan, Pa. He still brings up this incident as an example of ignorance, or worse, arrogance on the part of some Latin Rite Catholics, and will then tell you that it was a mistake for any Eastern Christians to have attempted a re-union with the Roman Church. To pile on a little further, I had been visiting an elderly woman, who had been one of our catechists, in a local nursing home. I encountered her son, who lives out of the area. He told me his horror story in his contacts with the local Latin-Rite Church. When he was a kid, he attended a Roman-Rite parochial school. At that time, his family was registererd in a Ukrainian Greek Catholic parish, and they were still on the Julian calendar. He requested permission to have "old calendar Good Friday" off so he could get to Church with his family. Permission was denied by one Sister Kunegunda, who commented "isn't it a shame that we have to crucify Christ twice?" If you wonder why there may be some attitudes on this board, please consider the possibility that these stories are a mere "drop in the bucket" as opposed to what others may have to relate.

Deacon Robert