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Hello,an Orthodox friend told me that the Catholic church has no business in Russia since it is "canonicaly" Orthodox.I quickly pointed out that Mexico is predominantly Roman Catholic and now undergoing Orthodox proselytizm.I was told that the orthodox missions in mexico were there to help the needy,but I found parishes listed in Mexico on the world wide web.My question is this,why are the Orthodox snobby when the catholic church erects parishes in mainly Orthodx countries when they do it in Catholic countries with almost no oposition?here is a link to the orthodox church in mexico http://www.oca.org/pages/min_orgs/special_adds/visittomexico/index.html

It would good to point out that the Mexican Orthodox faithful under the OCA were originally part of an "Old Catholic" group that was received into Orthodoxy in the 60's I believe. They were not "regular" Latin Catholics. I think it is a slander to say that the OCA is "proselytizing" the Mexican Catholics. There should be more worry over the Mormon and the Pentecostal sects in Mexico that are doing just that.

Undergoing Orthodox proselitism, hahaha
The Orthodox Church is extremely poor in Mexico. the only wealthy ones are the Antiochians but they don't help so much. No Orthodox Church has the aid of a foregn government like the Vatican or the support of powerful rich associations and enterprises to create missions in Mexico (this is the difference between the Russian-charismatic proselitism and the Orthodox missions of Mexico). Most priests of the Exarchate are working priests (they do not have big houses supported by the State like the roman priests).

The Orthodox Church is divided in small jurisdictions, the Constantinople one, the Antiochian, and the Exarchate of Mexico (the MP has a small parish in Nepantla).

There's also one thing about the missions, most of the converts are people who come from non-religious famillies or who were not practicant roman catholics. I don't trust very much the happy statistics of the RC here, stating that 90% of the population is baptized. Most of the members of the Pisaflores missions were not even baptized and a lot of Mexican people (catholics or not) have almost no knowledge of the basic christian doctrines (and in small rural areas, this leads to sycretist practices while in the cities leads to atheism).

For many years there had not been catholic presence in Pisaflores until they knew that there was an orthodox mission. Catholics sent a priest who started to preach and called the people "protestants", "lost souls" and other words (confirming that he knew nothing about the Orthodox Church).

There was also a problem in a parish in the town of Tlaltenco (near Mex City) when the Orthodox faithful had a chapel, and they faced the hostile attitude of the government and the liberation-theology-minded Roman Catholics. (the parish was received in the orthodox Church because the people did not want to obbey the marxist clergy and the reforms that were been promoted, like the elimination of altars and religious images). The local civil authority received the false humour that the Orthodox were promoting subversion and were "reactionary"(the problem remained for years). In 1990, finally (the year when religious freedom was made official!) the police evacquated the Orthodox and the Roman faithful received the chapel. With the new priest, the "spirit of thew times" arrived: the iconostas (painted by local artists) and the altar (which existed before, when the parish was roman) and all the icons were removed.

Yes some came from that group. In the 1910's there was an important movement of priests toward Orthodoxy. Some of them could go to the USA, where a Bishop for the newly Mexican Orthodox Church was to be consacrated by a Serbian Bishop. Unfortunately, half of the community decided to leave Orthodoxy and to found a Protestant Church (the civil authorities had fomented that division) and the religious persecutions of those years anihilated the movement. Some priests could escape to the USA (Mexican contribution was important in the history of the Orthodox Church in this continent). In the 50's some parishes were re-opened in Mexico, and although they were still uncanonical, some were using the Byzantine Rite. In the 1970's they were formally received.

FYI,

Here is a link [oca.org] for the visit of Metropolitan HERMAN to the Mexican Exarchate.

Tony

I was pleased to see his Beatitude, +Herman welcomed and giving his blessing at the Shrine of Our Lady of Guadalupe and at the Metrpolitan Cathedral.

I did not mean to slander the orthodox church,maybe I chose the wrong words to express my sentiment.I would much rather see the orthodox church prosper in Mexico then the mormon,jehovah witness,baptist or any other hetrodox sect.May God grant the Orthodox clergy in Mexico many years.

Glory to God for all things!

Valentino,

Most of the Catholics in Russia were placed there by the Russians. Empress Catherine the Great began a process, the partitions of Poland in 1772 which by 1793, I believe, destroyed the Polish Kingdom. The Russians also found that they were rulers of millions of Belarusian and Ukrainian Greek Catholics and millions of Lithuanian, Polish, and German Roman Catholics.

These Catholics found life under the Russian Orthodox Tsarist tyranny onerous. They resisted and rebelled. Many collaborated with Napoleon during the 1812 invasion of Russia. They rebelled in 1830 and again in 1863. The Russian Orthodox Church supressed the Greek Catholic Churches notably in 1839 and again in 1875. The Russians crushed all opposition (e.g. the Martyrs of Pratulin) with much bloodshed. Survivors were punished by being forcibly resettled in the interior of Russia. Many maintained their faith for decades without benefit of clergy or churches By the 1880s there were small enclaves of Catholics scattered throughout Russia, Siberia and Central Asia.

The two great Russian Orthodox thinkers, St. Anthony Khrapovitsky and Vladimir Soloviev observed that persecution of the Greek Catholics had not really destroyed the faith of the people. They both concluded that the laity, much like the Old Belivers who fled to the interior of Russia, would continue to practice their faith with greater fervor. They both noted that after two hundred years of persecution there were still millions of Old Believers scattered across the landscape of the Russian Empire.

In 1945 and 1949 the Soviets adopted the same policies toward Ukrainian, Carpatho-Rusyn, and Belarusian Greek Catholics as did the Tsars. They sent tens of thousands into forced labor in Russian, Siberian, and Central Asian Gulags. Lithuanian Roman Catholics were also deported to the Soviet interior. By the 1950s Siberian towns had unusually high proportions of Polish Roman Catholics and Ukrainian Greek Catholics. Modern Orthodox Russians who express "surprise," "shock," "indignation," that the descendants of these Catholic martyrs and confessors want to practice their faith need only to look at their own history.

Presviaytaya Bogoroditse Fatimskaya, spasi nas.
RusOrthCath martyrs and confessors, pray for us.

Happy Old Calendar New Year and blessed Feasts of St. Basil and the Circumcision!

Good info, RussOrthCath. The movement amongst the Russian Orthodox who wished to be in communion with Rome at the end of the 19th century is very interesting and revolved to a large extent around Vladimir Soloviev and his intellectual circle. This was sort of a Russian-style Oxford Movement.

Soloviev was received into communion with the Catholic Church by Father Nicholas Tolstoy who was one of the the first of the Russian Catholic priests who came into union with Rome, through the Melkites. Later Metropolitan Sheptytsky assisted the Russian Catholics and ordained many of them or arranged the ordinations and created an Exarchate for them.

Several Old Beleiver priests also came into union with Rome under the omophor of Metropolitan Andrey. Blessed Leonid Federov was another of these holy men, himself a priest in St. Petersburg.

Things are still very difficult for the Russian Catholics in Russia. Father Andrey Udovenko, the Greek Catholic priest in Moscow, leads an almost underground assistance and has his Divine Liturgy in the chapel of the nuns of Mother Teresa (Missionaries of Charity). Father Sergius Golovanov in Omsk likewise has reported very difficult circumstances.

Thank you for posting the information about the pastoral visit. I know some of the priests of the Cathedral.

It is said that many Orthodox priests in Russia wanted to be received into communion with Rome and that there's a lot of interest about byzantine catholicism, but that the Roman Catholic Church there, is not very willing to receive priests from the Orthodox Church and does not agree with the formation of a Byzantine-Rite community because they fear that would caise problems with the Orthodox.

Dear Remie,

Yes, you are correct and one of our bishops there has even protested this to the face of the RC Administrator, Kondrusiewicz.

How the formation of East Slavic Orthodox communities in communion with Rome is more offensive to Russian Orthodoxy than RCism and its (inevitable) active/passive proselytism is beyond me.

Both the secular and religious spheres of contemporary Russia should learn an historical lesson, once and for all - persecution not only breeds Martyrs, it breeds determination to continue in one's faith that, in turn, breeds converts.

That was also true in pagan Roman times.

Alex

Alex,
Historically for the Russians, as you must know, "Uniatism" was always the most hated, not Roman Catholicism (witness Catherine's invitation to the Jesuits) but Nicholas I's persecution of the GReek Catholics.

I remember in a biography of Fedotov, an incident of an Orthodox Metropolitan storming into the Greek Catholic (Russian recension) Church in St Petersburg, going behind the Iconostasis and interrogating the priests and then coming out and announcing to the congregation "This Church may SEEM Orthodox but it isn't, all the ORTHODOX, follow me!!!!" and he headed out.
The Eastern Catholic Churches have always seemed a "confidence trick" to the Russian Orthodox.

Dear Brian,

Yes, you are more than correct - from an historical standpoint.

I would submit that the reason why Orthodox have suspected Eastern Catholics and have hated them more than they ever did RC's was because there was LESS of a chance that an Orthodox would make the broader cultural jump, in terms of spiritual culture, to the Latin Church, than they would to the EC Church.

But not always. Anthony Khrapovitsky (now a local saint, I believe), actually PRAISED the Eastern CAtholics in Galicia for maintaining their Orthodox traditions etc. He was himself very well received in western Ukraine as Met. of Kyiv. And the Eastern renaissance in the Ukrainian and other Catholic Churches, largely due to Met. Andrew Sheptytksy, led to conversions to Orthodoxy via Khrapovitsky and St John Pommer of Latvia.

Uniate Metropolitans of Kyiv who scrupulously adhered to Orthodox traditions were also esteemed by the Orthodox. These Metropolitans, as noted in Fr. I. Nazarko's book, would do things such as prevent public processions in honour of St Josaphat etc. so as not to offend the Orthodox.

I was myself told by a ROCOR Orthodox priest to "maintain the Eastern traditions, even though you are a Uniate - never give them up!"

I told him that there is no problem with me, but more with my bishop . . .

Today, however, the situation is quite different in Russia. The difference has to do with the fact that there is an entire generation of "unchurched" Russians who see little difference among the churches and who definitely don't necessarily have a strong tie to Orthodox cultural Christianity. These Russians see no reason why they shouldn't "try out" Western Christianity, including, of course, Roman Catholicism.

And, for the first time, there is a really nasty reaction against the RC Church in Russia - I would venture to say, for this reason. Yes, BC's are subversive, from the ROC POV. But the RC Church completely takes Russian converts away from their spiritual cultural roots in Holy Russia.

The problem is that Vatican Ostpolitik is still running on yesterday's "no Byzantine Catholics in Russia" paradigms that are outdated and this is why expulsions of Latin priests, and now the request to have the Latin AA Kondrusiewicz removed entirely have left the Pope and his Cardinals scratching their heads in bewilderment.

One possible way out of this mess, if it is not too late, is for Rome to adopt the policy of leaving Russians alone, not accepting them to their Latin communities and when they come to them for pastoral care, to eventually lead them back to the ROC. And also Rome can lend some financial support to the ROC for its outreach programs, perhaps even some training in this regard.

There is much we can learn from Anglican missions in the 19th and 20th centuries. The Anglicans left their mission fields among the Oriental Orthodox and the Assyrians with a very high opinion of themselves among the Churches of those fields.

A case in point is Arthur Searley Cripps of Central Africa who actually took the side of his African converts, within a Christian Socialist perspective, and their countrymen against British imperialism.

To this day, Central African Christians call him, "Saint Arthur Cripps."

Alex

Alex,
As ever, you are a treasure trove! I am very grateful (among others) that you are on the Forum.

Peace,
Brian

P.S. ROCOR needs more priests like the one you encountered (minus using the word, Uniate)

Dear Brian,

Yes, I thought my mentioning "Christian Socialism" would make you happy!

But seriously, thank you, dear Orthodox Brother in Christ!

Alex

Hello:

My opinion is that the Orthodox Church, in this particular issue, is showing a great deal of hypocrisy.

What today is the OCA, started out as a Russian Orthodox mission outside its canonical territory.

Even by Orthodox standards, the only Orthodox Church entitled to establish missions outside its own canonical territory is the Ecumenical Patriarchate.

I don't know why any Orthodox presence outside "canonically Orthodox" territories would have to be considered ANY different than the presence of Catholicism in Russia.

Whatever reason or excuse the Orthodox may hwve to be here, us Catholics can also have to be there.

Now, I really don't mind the Orthodox conducting proselytist acts in Mexico, or among Hispanics in the United States. In fact, I have aided, with my translations, several parishes and missions that are doing just that.

I'd rather have fervent Orthodox than lukewarm Catholics any time.

And of course I rather see people finding a "complete" Christ in a Church of Apostolic Tradition than "pieces" of Christ in truncated communities or even sects or cults, which are also hard at work.

What I cannot take is the religious persecution of my brethren in Russia.

What I cannot take is the Patriarchate of Moscow granting itself the right to tell the Pope of Rome not to officially elevate the Ukrainian Catholic Church to the Patriarchal dignity.

What I cannot take is the double standard that the the Orthodox use to measure these things. In my book, that is called hypocrisy, and is grossly contrary to the Gospel.

Shalom,
Memo.