www.byzcath.org Forums News & Events Church News Patriarch Michel Sabbah of Jerusalem steps down tomorrow

antv,

That the Eparchies of Lungro degli Italo-Albanesi and Piana degli Albanesi and the Exarchial Monastery and Territorial Abbey at Grottaferratta exist neither precludes nor denies the historical reality of suppression that occurred within the Italo-Byzantine Churches - and it was not a matter of suppressing individual parishes for lack of an ethno-cultural body of faithful within territorial bounds. There is well-documented history of using Latin clergy to replace Byzantine clergy, of refusing to permit unshaven priests and married priests, etc.

The Eparchies and the Abbey are indeed noted for the purity of their adherence to historic liturgical form and praxis. They are, however, not proof against suppression, but a mere remnant of what once was.

Many years,

Neil

CV,

You read it correctly.

Byzantophile,

The highlighted opening sentence of the text you quote is a startling testimony to my point.


- translate that as pre-eminence of the Latin Rite.

Many years,

Neil

Shawn,

Actually, while there is only 1 canonically erected Ethiopian parish in the US, there are about a dozen and a half Ethiopian and/or Eritrean (Ge'ez) missions and/or communities in the US and Canada, of which about a half-dozen are regularly served pastorally (Liturgy at least monthly).

You can see the full details here, as to the Ethiopians and here, as to the Eritreans

Many years,

Neil

Very true! However, from the information you wanted me to see, this was not done by the Holy See, but was done by invading Normans.

From the Italo-Byzantine mission website:


This seems like it was a political move. The fact that the Normans were of the Latin Rite, a mere "accident of history" as we would have said in college.

I still don't see your point. How is this triumphalism? The majority of the population in Italy is of the Roman Rite with the exception of the Ambrosian and Byzantine rite areas.

If you think it is wrong for the majority to want to maintain the position of their rite, then you must really sympathize with the Poles in Ukraine who frequently complain that their rights are being trampled upon by the majority Ukrainians...

Wow. Having a Polish cardinal in L'viv and a full hierarchy... if that's having their rights trampled upon, perhaps we should have similar trampling of rights of Ukrainians in Warsaw.

Perhaps there is a misunderstanding

The eparchies of Lungro and Piana use indeed the Greek in the Liturgy (that is almost exactly the same of the one in the OO Greece), but they still exist only because they are Italo-Albanians communities (of Albanian mother tongue) still alive (well, since the VII century the Church protects them). They were people refugee from Albania (a country at North of the Greece, on the other side of the Adriatic see) since the XV century when the Muslim Turks occupied Albania.
These ethnic communities still speak Albanian (they of course speak also Italian), and their liturgy has been preserved because of their isolation, and survived only when and if these communities were numerous.
The Monastery of Grottaferrata is simply an Eastern-Rite Monastery placed near Rome, but without any Easter Rite population nearby (this monastery has been also a necessity for the Roman Curia because in St Peter the pre-conciliar solemn papal Mass needed of a Easter-Rite deacon and subdeacon to read in Greek the Gospel and the Epistle)

In other words, the Lungro and Piana Eparchies are NOT at all the sons of the ancient Italo-Greeks (Italians of Greek mother tongue) that existed in south Italy in the first millennium: during the Middle Age they lost their Greek language and so started to use the Latin Rite. In the XVI century there were no more of 45 Italo-Greek communities. Nowadays there are only traces in local dialects.

I whole-heartedly concur!

Shlomo Neil,

I thank you, but you may have misunderstood my point. When I brought over the Ethiopian priests from Rome, I was hoping that they would start rotating priests over here, and maybe setting up a exarchy or eparchy to solidify their communities here. Further, they have as many parishes as the Syriac Catholic Church which is a full eparchy.

Further, I have tried to get the Secretariat for African
American Catholics and organizations of African American Catholics. My hope was to get a few bi-ritual African American Priests that would serve the Ethiopian/Eritrean Ge'ez communities.

The only promble has been I have had little help in doing this, and I do have other things that I have to do. I would love to get back to this, but I really do not want to use my time if it will not be productive.

Poosh BaShlomo,
Yuhannon

That is a wonderful idea! I've been wondering about this for years now. There is a trend in the African-American community to-day to try to get in-touch with more "historical African" styles of Christian worship. Sadly, many people are led down the wrong path. Exposure to Ethiopian Catholicism, however, would be a very nice way of introducing non-Catholics to authentic ancient African Catholicism.

I have gotten some feedback that this thread has strayed far from the original topic. In reviewing it I have to agree with it. There are several good points that if pursued separately could make some good discussion thread topics. I would like thank all that participated in this thread.

In IC XC,
Father Anthony+
Administrator