www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life Faith & Theology Recensions

The word "recension" does not even exist in most of the languages used by the Orthodox Church - or by the Greek-Catholic Church, for that matter.

I am not responsible for the catalogue of the Vatican bookstore!

Fr. Serge

a fig for what romans want to call our liturgical uses!

I'd also point out that Bulgarians do not follow 'Nikonian' usage - they sort of pick and choose. True, the texts of prayers and chants follow 'Nikonian' phrasings, but their rubrics (like general Balkan use) tend to be a mix of Nikonian and Pre-Violakis Constantinopolitan usage, while their Holy Week follows Constantinopolitan use.

Bulgarians also sing Byzantine chant in Church-Slavonic - but don't tell them I said so; they insist that this is not "Byzantine" music, this is "Orthodox" music!

They tend to have good choirs, and have produced some excellent recordings.

Fr. Serge

I'm still not clear how they ended up as part of our eparchy, but they *are* Greco-Italo-Albanian, with Fr. Vivona (sp?) being the *mumble* of that rite in the U.S. (North America?).

Dochawk,

As I understand it, Vladyka George decided to erect the parish when St Gabriel's became aware that it was serving an increasing number of Italo-Greeks. (The parishioners of Our Lady of Wisdom, from what I know, are principally of Italo-Greek heritage, as opposed to the community of Our Lady of Grace in NY, who are primarily of Italo-Albanian ethnicity). The usage or rescension, whichever one prefers as a decriptor, is most commonly termed Italo-Greek, though the Church sui iuris is ordinarily styled as Byzantine Italo-Greek-Albanian.

Many years,

Neil

I've only been there once, but they were using the red books that we did prior to the RDL.

Amazing that it made sense to split a parish that small . . .

and in an unrelated note, we were at the Saturday vigil this week--and it was concelebrated by not two but *three* priests! (one retired, one visiting our pastor).

Had I not gone then rather than in the morning, the priests would have outnumbered the alter servers

hawk

Brother Neil-

Just to correct, Fr Archimandrite Francis serves the DL in accordance with the current liturgikon of the Metropolia of Pittsburgh.

Deacon John,

As I read your post, I recollect someone else posting that same comment a while back. Was this a change that came about since the promulgation of the new liturgikon?

I ask because Vladyka William and I had a conversation a few years ago (when he was in Boston for Sayedna Cyril's enthronement) regarding Our Lady of Wisdom. He mentioned at the time that the Divine Liturgy, as served there, was more reminiscent of that served in a Melkite parish versus one of the Byzantine Slav Tradition. It wasn't my sense, at the time, that he saw that as problematic or unexpected (given the community that was being served, it would have seemed odd if that were otherwise).

Many years,

Neil

I was waiting to see where this was going, as I also had heard they were on the BCC service books from when they were set up as a Mission by Bishop George.

Neil-

Fr Francis has always served the DL according to the liturgikon used by the Eparchy of Van Nuys. Having said that, Bishop William's comments are also true. The DL as served at OLOW is more in line with Greek usage though the service books are Ruthenian. I had the pleasure to serve as 2nd deacon this past Sunday for Fr Francis. (My family and I were in Las Vegas to celebrate my daughter's 21st birthday.) During the Liturgy he kept reminding (while ribbing) me, "This is a Greek parish." <GRIN>

The cantors use the melodies in the new people's book, and did an outstanding job. If OLOW began as a home for ethnic Italo-Greeks, the parish has certainly expanded its outreach to include Latinos, Anglos, and Thomas Christians, to name but a few. We had a glorious worship experience at OLOW.