www.byzcath.org Forums News & Events Church News "Church, State and the Proselytism Controversy in Russia"

Church Slavonic, the indigeous liturgical language of the East Slavic Constantinopolitan Church is more easily understood to these (Orthodox Lemkos) Eastern Christians than the Polish language. Even the Orthodox Church located in Prjashev (Preshov) still uses the Church Slavonic language and not literary Slovak.

Ung-Certez

Ung-Certez:

The Missale Romano (or the Novus Ordo), the liturgy of the Roman Catholic Church was issued originally in Latin, the "official" language of the Church.

However, each national Church is allowed to translate the Latin Liturgy into the language of the people, or into the lingua franca, for as long as such translation captures faithfully the authentic liturgy as mandated by the Vatican.

Offering the Holy Sacrifice of the Mass in the language of the people is NOT proselytism.


AmdG

Lance,

My personal experience is otherwise. The language I experienced being used in public worship in the Orthodox parishes in Poland is Church Slavonic. For the homily even Polish does not seem to be routinely used in the eastern areas Russian/Bielo-Russian is, perhaps in Warsaw and the west Polish is used more.

Bob

[ 08-30-2002: Message edited by: Bob King ]

It is when there never was an indigeous Latin Church in that territory. There has always been Eastern Christians in Ukraine. There never should be a "Ukrainian" Roman Catholic Church. There only were a few RCC for the Polish nobility during the years between 1596 up to the re-establishment of Ukraine after WWI when Ukraine briefly re-emerged as a independent state.
Historically speaking, there shouldn't be a "Ukrainian" Roman Catholic Church, only Ukrainain Greek Catholic and Ukrainian Orthodox Christians as they are historically the indigeous Church. Anything else I would consider proselytzing.

Ung-Certez

StuartK:

Uzhhorod and Mukachevo are, the last I heard, still one diocese not two. There the Church SLavonic language is used it seems almost exclusively. Although I hear that Bishop Margitich (one of Semedi's auxiliaries) is pushing for more modern Ukrainian and integration into the UGC hierarchy, which as most know is NOT the case now. Mukachevo/Uzhhorod answers directly to The Congregation not to L'viv.

I am curious about there being no legal impediment to using Rusyn. Do you mean on the level of civil government? Or Church? It is my understanding that Rome gives a sort of imprimatur for a language to be established as liturgical. Since you used the word impediment I presume you are aware of some Church stamp on Rusyn. (Intuition tells me this may be difficult since to my knowledge there is still technically no such thing recognized as Rusyn language or ethnicity as far as the civil government in Ukraine is concerned.)

Bob

Historically speaking, you'd have to ignore the numerous border adjustments of the past 400 years to say something like that. Just what constitutes "Ukraine" and what constitutes "Poland"? The 1598 borders? The 1646 borders? The 1792 borders? The 1918 borders? The 1923 borders? The 1945 borders? Then there is the matter of the migrations of peoples.

No, I meant a civil disability, not an ecclesiastical one. As to whether the Diocese of Mukachevo/Uzherod needs an imprimatur to issue a Rusin recension, I will merely point out that here in the US we have been going for about half a century or more now with Ukrainians, Ruthenians, Melkites and Romanians all celebrating the liturgy in English using a multiplicity of translations. I fail to see why, if the hierarchy of the Ruthenian Catholic dioceses in Europe felt the need to celebrate in the vernacular, they could not do so at their discretion.

Reminds me of the joke about how many Ruthenians it takes to change a light bulb.

Your nasty ethnic chauvinism is duly noted, thanks.

The Bishop of Presov (Prjashiv) gave permission to use Rusyn language liturgical books in various parishes, on a parish-by-parish basis where the priest requests it. There is no general permission to celebrate anything in vernacular, liturgical/literary Rusyn (of course, only the Mysteries of Initiation and the Gospel & Epistles currently exist). There is no movement to have the Divine Liturgy in Rusyn; Church Slavonic suffices for most of the non-Slovak population's needs (or so they say) and desires. (It is also said that the bishop has not granted such permission everywhere it was requested, and when the priest is transferred, his successor must renew the permission or be required to use the Slovak-language Epistle & Gospels.)

The official language of the Eparchy of Mukachevo (with its seat in Uzhhorod) is Ukrainian. Without a codified Rusyn literary language in Ukraine (one was proposed, but it met with resistance from various Rusyn activist circles, not the essence of it but the peculiars), there is nothing (no scriptures, no Liturgy) existing and any translation would be purely local. They could use the books from Slovakia (which might be a good interim solution), but it's different enough that the people probably wouldn't receive it as their own language. So any notion of a "vernacular" liturgical language in the Eparchy of Mukachevo for the indigenous East Slavs would default to Ukrainian, for better or worse. That could change in the future, but in my opinion it's unlikely. The conservative nature of the Rusyns there would give the preference to Church Slavonic, which the Orthodox eparchies (UOC-MP) in the Zakarpatska Oblast seem to be doing quite well with.

The Greek Catholic Cathedral in Uzhhorod has separate Sunday Liturgies in Church Slavonic, Hungarian, and Ukrainian, every Sunday.

Can I tell a condescending Polish joke now? Of course not, that would get me booted off this board so fast your heads would spin.

Dear Lance,

You're utterly mistaken. The Polish Autocephalous Orthodox Church has had only
ONE PARISH (Sts. Cyril and Methodios in Wroclaw, southwestern Poland) with all services in Polish. However, recently they have introduced the second
Sunday Liturgy (yes, yes - two Liturgies on one
altar!) - in Old Slavonic in Ukrainian pronounciation with Gallician rubrics.

The worst is that the PAOC celebrates Liturgy
in Old Slavonic with Russian pronounciation,
sermons very often are delivered in Russian (!),
while most Orthodox in Poland are ethnic Byelorussians and Ukrainians (including Lemkos).
Exceptions are very rare and - let's be sure -
has been made for proselytizing Greek-Catholics both on historical territories and lands of 1947 deportation.

Sincerely,
subdeacon Peter

Well, Metropolitan Andrew (Count Sheptytskyi)
of Halych issued in 1904 a pastoral letter
to Greek-Catholic Poles. Here you can see some
pieces from it:
http://www.mateusz.pl/goscie/grekat/szept.html
BTW, many of his patoral letters (if not all of them) issued before 1914, were published paralelly
in Ukrainian and Polish.

sincerely,
subdeacon Peter

Lemkos in Poland because of 1944-47 deportations
are both dispersed and heavily Polonized.

sincerely,
subdeacon Peter

"Historically speaking" various parts of Ukraine belonged from 1340s to 1795 to the Polish
Kingdom (since 1569 - the Polish-Lituanian Comonwealth). In the pre-war period western
Ukraine was under Polish rule. So the border
simply didn't existed.

sincerely,
subdeacon Peter

The correct answer is: "We're still waiting for Rome to grant us permission to change it".

[The correct answer is: "We're still waiting for Rome to grant us permission to change it".]

WHY? If you are this sui juris independent church which is only 'in communion with Rome' rather than 'under its authority'?

OrthoMan

By this I meant their internal official language, their language of correspondence, etc. Liturgically, they are polyglot except no Rusyn language. (Though I would hope that homilies in Rusyn, at least in the villages, are the norm. Even at St. Clement's GC Church/Cathedral in Prague, Rusyn homilies are the norm.)