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Please post pictures of the inside of any Melkite Churches you can find. PLEASE!!!

One of the first things a Maronite priest told me before I attended my first Maronite liturgy, was how similar to the Latin Rite it would be.

Shlomo Lawrence,

Hopefully with the completion of our Holy Synod, we will de-Latinize even more. Do not forget that it took centuries to become so Latinized, so it make take a few to get rid of it.

Poosh BaShlomo,
Yuhannon

If East/West unity exists anywhere in the hearts of man it is in Lebanon!

"One of the most beautiful, Holy Spirit filled and inspired words of a homily I EVER read about unity was written by the Patriarch of Antioch.

Too bad the new Antiochian converts from Protestantism in the U.S. are destroying that beautiful momentum. They bring their anti-Catholic baggage to a tradition of love and unity from the old world.

Alice"

Alice, Thank You for expressing this so well. I have also noticed this about the Antiochian converts. They were previously fundamentalist Protestants. As such, they formerly believed that salvation was only found in their church and that they were the "true" Christians. Their fanaticism offends many of us "cradle Orthodox" as they distainfully refer to us.
I am pleased to see from my experience on this Forum, that converts to Byzantine Catholicism do not share the same traits of the Antiochian Protestant converts. The Antiochians could learn a lot from the Byzantine Catholics.

I just don't get it...What is so bad about being latinised. Ok i know that it doesn't look authentic or traditional, but it is still a form of worship.


This is acting as an obsticle for Unity. I want you to look at the similarities not differences.

The photos are truly very well taken. The latinisation is a legacy of the colonial period when all things from the west and from Europe in particular were regarded sadly, by the indigenous of the near East and other Asian Churches, as superior to anything they had or could produce. The pity is that this mentality lingers and their own valid customs and traditions are discarded for the latest fad from Europe.

Charbel,

Much of our beauty and strength are in our universality and one of the principal aspects of that universality is the diversity of our Churches, both Catholic and Orthodox.

Your Church, with all due respect to you, my brother and friend Yuhannon, and our other Maronite members, lost 700 years of its ecclesio-cultural heritage to the West in 1182(?) when contact between it and Rome was re-established. It has taken almost a millenium for the Maronite Church to reach the point it is at presently - the painstaking task of recovering that.

Whether the heritage was lost through the zeal of the French in seeking to assure themselves of the Catholicity of these Christians whom they found in the mountains of the Levant or, it was thrown aside by the Maronites themselves in their own zeal to prove their Catholicity or, some combination of the two - probably the most likely scenario - is inconsequential at this point. To be a Church sui iuris, as Catholics term it (or an autonomous or autocephalous Church, as the Orthodox would speak of their Churches) is to be an ecclesiastical entity that has an identity unto itself and its people.

Yes, there is common dogma and shared doctrine, but there is a uniqueness that gives particular meaning to how those who are the faithful of a particular Church worship the God Whom they hold in common with their co-religionists.

That uniqueness, whether one terms it a Rite, Tradition, Rescension, or Usage encompasses a vast array of considerations - those which make our Churches all that each is.

Canon 28 of the Eastern Code of Canon Law defines a Rite as

Beyond that codified definition of "Rite", it should be further understood to be the collected liturgical patrimony or heritage by which a body of faithful conduct their religious life. It is more than just differences in language, culture, and vesture, although those are often among the most immediately obvious distinctions. It's often thought of as strictly applicable to liturgical worship service; it actually includes the totality of a people's religious expression, including their sacraments, sacramentals, devotions, prayers, liturgical music, and even aspects of their religious artistic expression and ecclesial architecture.

While I can and do appreciate the beauty of your Churches, regardless of the architectural style in which they are fashioned and furnished, I cannot help but wish for the day that I will walk into a Maronite temple and see iconography dominant rather than statuary, see Abouna garbed in vesture consistent with the Church's Syriac origins, and other signs of the liturgical origins of my brother Antiochians. It has begun to happen and, as Yuhannon said, it will continue. I pray for the day that it is fully accomplished.

Let me finish by assuring you that it is not my intent to disparage you or your Church. I am deeply fond of my Maronite brothers and sisters. When I was a young Army officer, away from both home and my own Byzantine Church for the first time, the sole Eastern parish near my base was Maronite. For the year that I remained in that area, Father Waldimir Akeekee, of blessed memory, and his parishoners at Saint George's Church treated this red-haired Melkite with the funny Boston accent as if he were one of their own. I will always remember their kindness to me.

And I never hear the priest's Prayer to the Holy Table, at the closing of the Service of the Divine Mysteries without being chilled by the haunting beauty and depth of spirituality that it evokes.

Just another thought - latinization was foisted on your Church so long ago that it is just a reference in history books. Much latinization in our own Churches happened recently enough to be remembered, certainly by the generation just older than us and we learned of it directly from them, besides seeing it. Thus, to us, the wounds are fresh and still smarting in many instances.

Many years,

Neil

Irish melkite,

Thanks for respecting the Maronite church, and for clarifying; however, I don't agree that our holiness or the idea that God is going to accept us more if we change our "affected" traditions, Statues...The belief is still there!

I wish we had the popcorn eatng icon. I guess this will du

yeah we surely do need some popcorn, LOL

Hi Alice,
I have always appreciated the charity and evenness of your posts from the earliest days of your posting here (much more charitable than I), and usually agree with you.

But I think that this comment is over the top for two reasons:

One, it is a generalization and certainly not true of all converts to the Antiochian church, or even all fundamentalist converts. Also not all converts of this background affiliate with the Antiochians.

Two, it is off-topic. We have these magnificent images of temples to inspire us and then there is this comment.

I know that what you state here may be true of some people, and most probably some prominent authors we all know of. But we will not solve this problem by demonizing the lot of them and sweeping their opinions under the rug. Their critiques of ecumanism and the western church must be addressed head-on and honestly, and if there is any merit to these it cannot be dismissed as simply baggage from the bad old Protestant days.

These former evangelicals (and I suppose former fundamentalists) have become Orthodox for a reason, and they have been accepted by the Antiochian church for a reason. Perhaps Metropolitan Philip has an explanation for all of that.

In the meantine I look forward to many more images of temples to our God from around the world. They are marvelous to behold.

your brother Michael

I realize this is a tangent, but I will have to echo Hesychios that I am somewhat taken aback by the same comments. I will also offer my own opinion and personal experience, for whatever that is worth.

I will say first off I have (or had) my own issues with the convert culture that permeates the Antiochian Archdiocese, but not the one that has been expressed here. A priest (not Antiochian) of my acquaintance once told me that what the Antiochians specialize in are �thoughtful Protestants�. In other words they are not rabid fundamentalists with a visceral hatred of Catholicism, though certainly they disagree with it on many points. Most AOA converts, who I have spoken with, usually had seriously considered Catholicism first. Also in the time I spent attending Antiochian parishes I ran across numerous current and former Catholics (Western and Eastern). I�m also aware of several functions held by the Antiochians where local Catholic priests were invited to attend. Lastly, almost every Antiochian who I spoke with was amazingly sympathetic to unity with the Oriental Orthodox.

So take all of that as one different set of experience.

In regards to the thread, Flickr has an Orthodox photo pool here [flickr.com] .

Andrew

Dear Michael,

If you read how the thread was *developing*, I think that you will see that my post was not "off topic".

You might also want to note that I started my post in reference to the Latin ecclesiastical decor in the beautiful churches Charbel posted and (which another one of our posted noted a bit disappointedly) like this:

Let's also remember that this is 'Town Hall', and this is the one forum where threads are allowed to develop without too many strict parameters.

Furthermore, my post was appreciated by Charbel, our Lebanese brother who actually started this thread, and by others.

In any case, I am not here to win appreciation of posts but to moderate, and I am allowed to also express my personal opinions. Generalizations exist absolutely everywhere, and whether people like them or not, they are usually used as a barometer of classification and description--with exceptions, ofcourse.

My own personal experiences with a few Antiochians who are also associated with the lay group OCL, have been quite different from Andrew/Rilian's. They are obnoxiously anti-Catholic, and so much so that one (very involved in the movement for Orthodox unity) cradle Antiochian woman literally freaked out when I showed her the Patriarch's homily, saying that she would show that to her Bishop and see what 'he would have to say about that'.

I am sorry if my personal experiences have offended anyone. Brian seems to know exactly what I am speaking of.

If it makes you feel any better, please feel free to 'generalize' about Greek Orthodox. There are many generalizations of us which I will surely not contest!

Sincerely in Christ,
Alice, Moderator

Ahhh, that explains a good deal. As Robby the Robot would say "danger Will Robinson!"

Andrew