www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life The Christian East & West Latin priests celebrating Eastern liturgy in Antiquity

(JMJ Coder mentioned this a few days ago on catholic.com forum)

This persons comment severly perplexes my understanding of Church jurisdictional unity.In the past this surely could not have been a rule which existed for otherwise St Jerome himself (from a Western Latin region) could never have been ordained by Patriarch Paulinus of Antioch in 379 A.D. and celebrated any liturgy with him....

Can anyone tell me when the rule requiring Latin priests to seek permission from a latin hierarch in order to celebrate an Eastern Liturgy came to exist?

First, the priest would have to take some instruction from an Eastern Catholic priest, then ask the Eastern Catholic Hierach to grant his permission to serve in his Eparchy as a Bi-Ritual priest. I Do believe the last step would to ask permission from his Roman Catholic Ordinary for time away from his Latin Rite parish duties. This would seem the logical process.

Ung

Also worth noting is there is considerable difference in the circumstances between the allowance for a parish priest to celebrate a eucharistic rite foreign to him versus a priest serving under a Patriarch in a different church using a different ritual usage.

Of course I think we find if we are honest about it, a good deal of change in certain administrative rules which are neither dogma nor doctrine and not set in stone.

Uhm, if we're talking about 379 A.D., before the time of the real codification of the liturgical ceremonies, it would not have mattered. The key factor was the 'gathering of the faithful' for Eucharist. Much like contemporary Americans going to a Japanese restaurant, you have to learn what they're doing and then try to adapt as best as possible.

St. Augustine, while on travel, was intending to head to Rome to visit the communities there. He, being a cleric of a North African community, had a pattern for celebrating the Eucharist in their communities around the diocese of Hippo. He asked Bishop (St.) Ambrose, bishop of Milan, what he should do while visiting the Romans.

St. Ambrose, Doctor of the Church that he was, wisely replied: when in Rome, do as the Romans do.

The church is local. It's the community with their bishop/priest celebrating Christ.

Only after Rome began to consolidate its authority over the various national churches in the West and impose a type of liturgical/disciplinary unity on them, did the "Latin" vs. "Byzantine" or Eastern or Western mindset come into play. The suppression of the Ambrosian rite (Milan), Mozarabic rite (Spain), Gallican rite (France) and Sarum/Salisbury rite (England) came as a result of 'unifying' the Western Church, both liturgically as well as organizationally. This didn't really happen in the East, where the (later) Byzantine rite still comes in many flavors.

I believe that the later prohibition of "mixing" clergy from various liturgical and administrative jurisdictions was intended to prevent syncretism, i.e., the addition of elements from outside the 'official' mandated order of the service. A Roman/Latin priest at a Byzantine community had to wear his own vestments and 'attend' the liturgy but not vest as an Easterner nor take a primary role in the celebration. Ditto for Eastern clergy, who had to vest as Eastern and who could stand in the sanctuary. This was oftentimes ignored, probably for the very Christian reason of 'welcoming' an invited guest. Of course, bishops could do what they wanted - within reason.

Blessings!

Dr John

I suppose that the prohibition of "mixing" clergy was made to protect the smaller rites.
Having separate clergy requires separate seminaries (schools for priests), and this allows to keep alive various traditions, even small, in the same area.

Only after Rome began to consolidate its authority over the various national churches in the West and impose a type of liturgical/disciplinary unity on them, did the "Latin" vs. "Byzantine" or Eastern or Western mindset come into play.

Thus the reason for the partial schism of 1054-1204 was well founded. This is probably why the filioque was forced on the east. The Holy Roman Empire when it started putting its bishops in as Popes confused caesar's power in secular state with papal power over the Church of God, nor did the Franks know the the filioque was not apostolic and the east found other ways to fight arianism besides it. Although the west probably did have too much liturgical diversity around 700 AD to than bring about the opposite hardly seems like an advantage.

This presumes a worldview that we could debate for several years on...

I don't know if you are a recent convert or an enthusiast or which... but to ascribe to the Latin Church a history of subjugation of proto-autocephelous polyarchy churches smacks of a sort of revisionism.

A couple of considerations:

a) there is a distinction between "can" and "may". Whether a Latin priest can celebrate the Eucharist according to a liturgical tradition not his own does not depend on anyone's permission, but rather on his ability and education. Permission comes into the discussion if someone asks whether he may celebrate the Eucharist according to a liturgical tradition not his own. The distinction is not merely a word game - in consequence of it, should the Latin priest, for whatever reason, celebrate the Eucharist according to a liturgical tradition not his own, the celebration will be entirely valid. In a case of emergency or urgency, he may reasonably presume permission per modum actus.

b) one may seriously discuss the question of whether a Ruling Bishop of a diocese does not have ex officio the rite to authorize any Priest in good standing to celebrate the Eucharist in that Bishop's diocese without further reference to any other authority.

The legitimate question regarding the Priest who desires to celebrate the Eucharist according to a liturgical tradition not his own is the question of his ability and education. Oddly enough, one finds that this question is often not even addressed in the case of a Priest seeking such a "faculty" from the Holy See.

Fr. Serge

The Ambrosian Rite of Milan has not been suppressed, on the contrary it has been renewed. The Mozarabic rite is restricted to Toledo Cathedral, but it still exists, and the Sarum Use was not a separate rite as such. Finally, the Gallican Rite disappearted as a separate entity but it was not was not suppressed, it was amalgamated with the Roman Rite - prayers in the "Tridentine" Rite starting "Deus, " were Roman, prayers starting "Omnipotens sempiterne Deus, " were from the Gallican.
Also from the Gallican tradition was the word "Missa" meaning a prayer, especially the Eucharistic Prayer.