www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life Faith & Theology Orthodox in communion with Rome

Exactly, not every practice in Ruthenia and Ukraine is strictly a "latinization." just because the russians or arabs don't do it doesn't mean it is a latinization. In fact there are many small traditions that are characteristically Carpatho-rusyn/ukraianian that many many many people quickly bat off as a latinization.

'Scholastic theology' is too broad a category to warrant the strength of the opposition you brook between it Eastern theology. Even were one to speak of Thomism specifically, one wouldn't be speaking of a seemless monolith, and even here, Rome has demonstrated its unwillingness to swallow Thomism wholesale (*Immaculate Conception*).

>>Actually, Neo-Thomism would be a better description for following the Immaculate Conception because St. Thomas Aquinas and his heirs denounced the teaching as heretical. It's something how a doctrine can go from being denounced as heresy to being a matter of divine revelation. LOL.

A professor mine - himself neither a thomist nor a scholastic - was fond of saying that while he had little use for Thomas or his ideas, one thing St. Thomas definitely did not deserve was his wacky followers!

Fr. Serge

Most Eastern Catholic Churches in the US are very ethnic still. Because of this, a lot of latinized mentality still persists. Another reason is that there a clergy who still insist on latinizations despite its irrelevance.

I am Melkite in the vein of Archbishop Elias, so if that makes me a heretic, then the only alternative is for my hierarch to kick me out of my Church. Of course, since he was on the Holy Synod that officially adopted the Zoghby Initiative, I doubt that that is going to happen.

I am completely Othodox and completely Catholic. Anything else and we are Roman Catholics with pretty pictures on the wall.

Dear Friends,

Just a note to say that I've met many priests and presbyteras from Ukraine itself who inform that the very word "Orthodox" causes their parishioners to make sour faces, especially during the Liturgy.

For these and others, "Orthodox" is still too connected with the state church of the USSR for it to have any positive connotation at all. "Catholic" is very well received since it was formerly repressed as a Church and a name.

However, others will openly use "Orthodox in communion with Rome."

I won't use it since it deeply offends the Orthodox Christians I know and work with. For them, to be in communion with Rome is to cease being "Orthodox."

For Basilians parishes and parishes where the clergy are Roman-trained, the term "Orthodox" is looked on with suspicion as they somehow think that too much of that word and what goes with it and the spirit of Met. Josef Siemashko will reappear to take millions more Greek-Catholics into Orthodoxy!

Alex

Hmm... let's experiment!
_____
Σώσον, Κύριε, καί διαφύλαξον η�άς από τών Βασιλιάνικων τάξεων!

Tertullian,

I think we appear to have chaos because of two factors: a primary one that seems to consist of significant numbers of Eastern Catholics who are not fully affirming what the Catholic Church has dogmatically affirmed and declared.

A secondary one would seem to be that the Vatican has not always taken every opportunity to be definitively precise in this area, though I think it appears to have been reasonably precise in the Code of Canons for the Eastern Catholic Churches as well as in Ad Tuendam Fidem. Also, the Vatican at this time appears to be extremely reluctant to exercise any rigorous discipline on the Eastern Catholic churches.

I would think that all Catholics must have a uniform identical faith in substance and content as well as regard to morals.

I suppose I would agree with a standard Orthodox view that there is no such thing as Orthodox in communion with Rome. One is either Catholic, or one is Byzantine Eastern Orthodox or Oriental Orthodox.

Best to all,
Robster

Dear Apotheoun,

No argument there!

But if it is true that one cannot be a Saint without one's cooperation - how is it that the children that Herod killed in Bethlehem are saints in heaven and are liturgically commemorated?

Certainly, they had no inkling what was even happening to them and for what cause.

And one could also argue that if everyone is conceived in the same manner (the Theotokos and John the Forerunner included) then why is it that their Conceptions are liturgically celebrated where they are invoked as Saints - and because that moment of their lives is being feted, liturgically this means that they were sanctified at the moment of their Conception.

How else could one understand that? What aren't the conceptions of all Saints liturgically celebrated then? Or yours and mine, for that matter?

Alex

What I find truly sad here, as I digress a bit, is that when I first began attending a Ukrainian Catholic Church, I never tried to tell people what they or their church should or shouldn't be. Instead I got to know the people and their lives, their spiritual beliefs and the history of the parish, which incidentally used to be located in my old neighborhood in Chicago. Despite my being Anglo-Irish and still a Latin Trad, I was fully accepted, and in the past year, I've helped out with work around the church, helped prepare Ukie dishes in the kitchen, got hugged and kissed by old ladies, and most memorable of all, I've watched people some of whom are over 80 years old come to church in rain, snow or shine (when their adult kids and grandkids often wouldn't) with their canes and walkers, and then I've watched them kneel and pray in church for 15-20 minutes before the start of the Liturgy. So what is it that I find so sad here ? It's the idea of telling these people (and I expect someone will quote Oriental Lumen to me) that I've become very fond of, that for all these years you've been doing it WRONG. The church you grew up in from where your grandparents were married and buried seriously needs a makeover because it needs to be fully Orthodox.

I think most posters on this forum are aware of the fact that many Ukrainian Catholic parishes in North America will face extinction in the next 10 years due to aging congregations, but in my opinion from what I've observed, you can lock the doors forever, even earlier than that, if you take away the only church these people have known.

Yeah I agree with you Lawrence, at may parish everything is VERY eastern becuase my priest is good about that. About fifteen minuets down the road is another older Ukrainian parish, the congreation is q lot larger but older and they still have a lot of latinizations. The priest there allows it (as would my priest and myself if I was one) because, who are we to tell them in their old age that the way they worship is wrong?

Dear Lawrence,

Too bad the UGCC doesn't have YOU as a pastor!

Your sensitivity and understanding are truly admirable - your post almost brought me to tears.

Bl. Basil Velychkovsky CSsR worked to bring Orthodox into communion with Rome in his time in Volyn (two former Orthodox professors of theology and three former Orthodox monks of the Pochaiv Lavra became martyrs for union with Rome as a result of his mission and he reported their martyrdoms to Rome for eventual canonization).

But he insisted on following all the local Orthodox traditions and customs to the letter, including the veneration of ALL local Orthodox saints.

In his diary, he wrote that he specifically forbade new converts to ECism to kneel to receive Communion.

But he soon found that it was of no use since the new converts made it a point to kneel, say the rosary etc. even though they did not have a tradition of doing this as Orthodox Christians (?).

One MIGHT suppose that they saw such practices as "Catholic identifiers" and so took to them like fish to water - I don't know.

Your UGCC parish and people are lucky to have you.

Perhaps the UGCC will truly become mission-minded to avoid extinction . . .

One can only encourage them so far.

Alex

there is no such a thing..orthodox in communion with Rome...
it sounds like a joke...anyone who considers the pope as the head of the church, belongs to papism and has nothing in common with the orthodox church.
(more about the orthodox view, www.xxxxxxxx.org [xxxxxxxx.org])

Dear Zan,

Excellent points!

Latinizations in the Kyivan Orthodox Metropolia were the same as with the Eastern Catholics.

In fact, Latinizations were tacitly encouraged during the Kyivan Baroque era as a way to actually combat the movement among Orthodox students and aristocracy to become Catholics (and LATIN Catholics for the most part at that).

Many went to study in Paris. They came back to the Kyivan Metropolia as Orthodox still, but they took with them numerous Western devotions, to wit:

The Rosary (please stop with your snickering, Charles! ;))

Various Chaplets, the medal of the Immaculate Conception, the Bloody Vow, Immaculate Conception Brotherhoods, Way of the Cross, the Little Office of the Most Holy Virgin Mary, scapulars, Western pictures venerated as icons, devotion to the Humanity of Christ re: the Wounds of Christ, the 15 prayers of St Birgitte etc.

The veneration of the Pieta was very popular among the Ukrainian Orthodox Kozaks, in particular - the image of the sorrowful Virgin Mother weeping over her crucified Son - many mothers of Kozaks could identify with this. The UGCC celebrated the "Tenth Friday" in honour of the Most Sorrowful Mother (there were several Western images honoured as miraculous by the UGCC in Galicia) and the Ukrainian Orthodox took over this devotion, even using UGCC prayerbooks that they only took out from under lock and key once a year for the feastday.

My parish still celebrates the May devotion, but does this with Eastern Paraclesis services during the week and the Akathist on Saturdays and Sundays.

As for the Sacred Heart devotion, not only our older people practice that, so too the newly-resurrected EC Churches in Eastern Europe - so much so that you will find Sacred Heart images in Orthodox Churches as well!

Eucharistic adoration is observed by entire villages, as I've heard from about 11 priests now - even pre-school children want to have their assigned hour of Adoration in Church!

This isn't only for older people who are dying out here. These Latin devotions are experiencing a real renewal in Eastern Europe and are energizing the life of devotion among all generations there.

And all our EC New Martyrs, Bl. Paul Goydych et al., they ALL were devoted to the Sacred Hearts of Jesus and Mary, to Eucharistic Holy Hours and the Rosary et al.

They would have been horrified to learn about our "Orthodox in communion with Rome" movement, one would surmise.

Alex

Alex, What is "the Bloody Vow"? I never heard of it.

Ray

Dear Ray,

It is a vow to defend "to the blood" or "to the death" the Immaculate Conception.

Members of the Confraternities of the Immaculate Conception took it, including the Orthodox ones in the Kyivan Metropolia.

Sts. Charles Garnier, SJ and Noel Chabanel SJ of the North American Jesuit Martyrs both took it and both died around the feast of the Immaculate Conception, Dec. 8th (1649).

Alex