www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life The Christian East & West United Eastern Church in America?

I have a question that may seem a bit basic to "native" Eastern Christians, but to this Roman Catholic, the answer is not clear.

I have read many things from Orthodox sources talking about a united Orthodox Church in America (especially recently from Metropolitan Jonah); i.e. one American jurisdiction. My question is: how much desire is there really to have one American jurisdiction within Orthodoxy in this country? Do most people in the "pews" (or standing, as the case may be ) really want there to be one jurisdiction, or are most Orthodox Americans content with the status quo of multiple jurisdictions within Orthodoxy in America? I know from experience that what you see on the Internet does not necessarily reflect the true sense of the faithful, so I don't want to jump to conclusions from what I have read around the web.

A related question: what about Eastern Catholicism in America? Is there a desire among the faithful for there to be one jurisdiction for Eastern Catholics in this country?

Thanks for any answers you all can give.

Everybody wants just one jurisdiction--as long as it is theirs.

I think that broadly most Orthodox have become more conscious of the scandal of the jurisdictional chaos in N. America and Western Europe. Even the hierarchs in the old country seem to be grasping that the situation is untenable (not to mention uncanonical).

Several decades ago few Orthodox cared. Most of the jurisdictions were essentially ethnic clubs with services mostly in non-English languages that had little interest in evangelism. That remains true of a few even today. But those days are largely over. The vast majority of cradle Orthodox in America do not self identify as Greeks or Russians or (fill in your favorite ethnic group). They think of themselves as Americans first. Increasingly the languages of the old country are lost on the younger generation. Greek and Slavonic are rapidly giving way to English. In some of the more "American" jurisdictions all English is now the norm.

There are still many Orthodox who do not think that we are ready for an autocephalous church. But there are very few who want to continue the current system of balkanized jurisdictions. Even those opposed to autocephaly mostly favor a unified autonomous church that is under the wing of either the Ecumenical Patriarchate or the Russian Church with provisions built in to preserve the ethnic flavor of individual parishes. (Few would argue with that.)

The short answer is that very few Orthodox in America today don't want some sort of administrative unity. There is some debate however on the ultimate terms of that unity.

Under the mercy,
John

Don't know why this happened, but it did: Rome was strenuously opposed to "parallel" jurisdictions of Roman Catholics in the Americas (the only place I can think of where the battle was lost is Manitoba - it's a fascinating story), but on the other hand Rome did absolutely nothing to promote the idea of a unified jurisdiction for Greek-Catholics, or a unified jurisdiction for Chaldean Catholics and Syro-Malabar Catholics. Divide et impera?

At least once this became completely absurd: the case of Bishop Jaroslav (Gabro), who was the first bishop of the Greek-Catholic (Ukraine) Chicago diocese. By ethnic origin, Kyr Jaroslav was half Ukrainian and half Romanian, but he was never allowed to do anything for the Romanian Greek-Catholics, who were in urgent need of a bishop!

Fr. Serge

Francis, my friend,

Myriad prior discussions here strongly suggest that there is little to no consensus for a common jurisdiction uniting the faithful of all the Byzantine Catholic Churches sui iuris which presently have their own canonical jurisdictions in the US - the Ukrainians, Melkites, Ruthenians, and Romanians. In particular, the first two have strong ties to their primatial hierarchs in their ancestral homelands, which would unquestionably suffer from any such scheme. As to the Byzantines with a presence but no hierarchy here at present - the Russians and Italo-Greico-Albanians, there has been an increasing tendency on their parts to make accomodation with their sister Churches to establish formal or informal ties to them (the Russians with the Melkites principally, but with the Romanians in one instance; the Italo-Greico-Albanians in one instance with the Ruthenians).

Then, of course, there are the Oriental Catholic Churches, each of which is represented in the US by either stand-alone parishes or by one or more eparchies. All of them are so tied to their ancestral homelands as to make it unimaginable that they would see the way clear to a unified jurisdiction - even for those of common ritual heritage.

Many years,

Neil

I think there is far less consensus about this amongst the laity than implied. StuartK's comment is not far off the mark for either Orthodox or Eastern Catholics. Amongst some Orthodox jurisdictions like ROCOR and several others any sort of jurisdictional amalgamation will be strongly resisted.

Amongst the Greek Catholics there are churches like the UGCC that are trying to act as a unified world-wide Eastern Catholic Church (a good thing) in matters such as catechetics, etc. that frankly would not want to have (nor should be forced to have) a subset of parishes limited to some kind of American sui iuris identity.

It's a circular situation - the Eastern Catholics won't do it unless forced by Rome, and Rome really can't do it unilaterally if the platitudes of recent pro-Eastern Magisterial documents mean anything. If Rome were to do something along those lines there would be all kinds of finger pointing (including some by Orthodox polemicists) for interfering in the administrative structures of the Eastern Catholics.

I am a Ukrainian Greek Catholic living in the US, but would never consider myself a member of an American Greek Catholic Church. Smacks too much of Ireland and his ecclesiastical worldview.

Shlomo Francis,

If I may tweek your question. The better way to put it is how many support having one jurisdiction based on Liturgical Tradition?

What many Roman Catholics do not not relize is that the Eastern Churches are more than just Byzantine. You have the Antiochene-Edessan Churches (both East and West), the Armenian Church and the Alexandrian Churches.

Also, I would suggest that you use the poll option to see what people here think.

Fush BaShlomo,
Yuhannon

ROCOR has always favored jurisdictional unity in N. America. They just think it should be under the Russian Church. From an historical point of view their argument carries a great deal more weight than the Ecumenical Patriarch's. The only real opposition to unity is from the smaller ethnic jurisdictions. But they are slowly dying. The jurisdictions that are growing are the Antiochians, and the OCA. Alone among the ethnocentric jurisdictions ROCOR is not doing too badly. The rest are in less than great shape.

I would love for a single Byzantine Catholic Church in America with English as the primary language. The evangelization potential would be greatly enhanced (as would a single Orthodox Jurisdiction). I was wondering if anyone had an answer to this question.

When a non-Catholic wants to come into communion with the Church why can't they choose which rite to belong to? Doesn't this hurt our Eastern Churches if a protestant wants to become Catholic but feels at home in the Eastern Church and agrees with the theological views of the Eastern Church. He would be received but then be a Latin rite even though he came to the Church through an Eastern parish. I know that he would still be able to attend and be a parishioner but officially he would be Latin Rite. What if he had a vocation, what them?

(Diak)

As it happens, John Ireland's name had nothing to do with his ecclesiastical worldview. He was just as nasty to poor immigrants from Ireland as he was to the Greek-Catholics. His "worldview", if he had one at all, was for a purely English-speaking, upper middle class, Catholicism - the sort of thing he considered "respectable". Horrible man.

Fr. Serge

Francis,

There is some interest in single structures for Byzantines (thinking in the terms of liturgical families), but not a whole lot. There are still a large number of people who believe that ethnicity is vital for the survival of their Church. And so for many ethnic promotion trumps the Gospel message. A large fear of administrative unity is based upon an underlying fear of loss of ethnicity of Church.

Logically, it will eventually occur (among liturgical families). The numbers of Byzantines (Greek Catholics) in the ethnic jurisdictions in America (Ukrainians, Ruthenians, Melkites, Romanians) are dropping rapidly. Probably what one will see first is cooperation in like things (such as a single marriage tribunal for all the Churches, or possibly even just handing the whole thing over to a large and willing Roman Catholic diocese with a single coordinated structure). Such cooperation will grow until events (probably financial) force mergers.

I do pray daily for a true and radical dedication to the Gospel, with ethnicity given its appropriate place. The Eastern Churches could grow wildly given the right conditions and leadership.

John

There are already plenty of ROCOR faithful uneasy about now being de facto in communion with the EP, the Antiochians, and the OCA. I'm not sure they will allow themselves to be pushed into any amalgamation for that matter. And regarding the Antiochians, it will be interesting to see what the future holds with the recent hierarchal disagreements regarding the reduction of all bishops to "auxiliary" status.

I want to thank everyone for their responses - it has been enlightening to me. I especially appreciate Yuhannon's reminder that there are multiple traditions within Eastern Christendom and that I should not lump them together too quickly.

I also have to be honest: as a former Evangelical Midwestern American and an ethnic "mutt," I have never had any attachment to a specific ethnicity, so I have a hard time understanding those who do have such attachments. That is not to say that I don't respect the importance of culture in one's life and in their faith, but my own upbringing was so ethnically "bland" (can you be any more bland than Midwestern Methodist?) and detached from history that I have little personal experience to draw from. So I tend to just think: "why would it be so hard to have just one Orthodox Church in America - and one Eastern Catholic Church - and be done with it?" Yes, it might sound naive at best to many here, but I would imagine others might think in a similar fashion.

I believe he certainly did have an ecclesiastical outlook that included opposition to Pascendi, the removal of any and all ethnic identities from American parishes and a movement towards greater autonomy free from Rome for a genuinely American RC hierarchy. Unfortunately in some regards he was successful.