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There is a strange twist to the story of my friends in TN. Their BC Bishop didn't give them much support and the LR priests were there for Divine Liturgy but not much else. A member of the parish, who was Ukrainian, was ordained a priest by UGC Parma and things got a little crazy. Everyone from the community packed up and started a Ukrainian mission--preferring to have a dedicated priest and each other over a building. The local Latin Bishop (who happens to be dual-rite Maronite)is letting them use his chancery chapel.

It's a little more complicated than that, and I'm not sure how much of their story I'm able to share.

Many in the community were converts, or from various rites, so they didn't have any allegiance to one eparchy or another. I hoped that the Byzantines and Ukrainians could somehow work together to evangelize East TN, but it didn't work out that way.

IMHO if the Eastern Catholic churches want to grow and survive they need to drop the ethnic ghetto mentality. I know that this was one of the goals of your mission parish.

Melkite Archbishop JOSEPH (Tawil) wrote prophetically in 1970, "One day all our ethnic traits - language, folklore, customs - will have disappeared. Time itself is seeing to this. And so we can not think of our communities as ethnic parishes, primarily for the service of the immigrant or the ethnically oriented, unless we wish to assure the death of our community. Our Churches are not only for our own people but are also for any of our fellow Americans who are attracted to our traditions which show forth the beauty of the universal Church and the variety of its riches."

My prayer is that this becomes a reality in our time.

I would like to know more about the " bi-ritual mission". Is it a ER mission served by a bi-ritual priest or somthing else. What rite is your priest? What input is there from the Bishops of each rite? I have heard of missions that are served by a bi-ritual priest but not of a bi-ritual mission. Could you explain what you mean?

I agree. I had the feeling at times (years ago) that some people thought that God was Ukrainian. I am not being disrespectful here, I know what hardships and sacrifices Ukrainians made under the Soviets to keep their way of worship alive and that they would naturally want to preserve it when immigrating to North America. As a child of immigrants, I grew up speaking Ukrainian and worshiping in Ukrainian but then, aside from "customs" kept at holidays, became very much the American kid. As a senior now, with parents long passed away and no longer living in the ethnic ghettos of my childhood, very little opportunity to speak my Ukrainian remains and when I do I find that it is lacking in pronunciation and choice of words. I do not speak the "Kings" Ukrainian. I speak the Ukrainian of the pre-WWII immigrants which does not bear much resemblence to modern day Ukrainian.
The fact is that now, today, children rarely marry "their own", in religion or ethnic backround. Ethnicity is gradually becoming a thing of the past for many and except for an occasional Mnohaya Lita or Vichnaya Pamyat, very little reference to language of our fathers remains in the mission churches, some of whom now call themselves simply Eastern Rite. I have attended liturgy where both English and Ukrainian are used alternately and it is wonderful for those of us who still love to hear prayers as we learned them as a child, spoken . Thankfully there are also still liturgies done entirely in Ukranian and I love those as well. Attending those are by choice. One, in most cases, must travel back to the "city" to hear them. For suburbanites and their children it is understandable that they would embrace an English liturgy in their own neighborhood . And where is that to be found? In the Latin Churches. How many of these same people, who were raised and baptised Eastern Rite would attend a Liturgy held in the neighborhood LR parish if it were offered. Even a once or twice a month service would serve them. We cannot expect to build Eastern Churches in enough communities to serve all who might attend. A joining together with existing Latin churches could be a sensible solution. Sharing space, activities and costs would benefit all, and make the fact that an Eastern Church exists known to those who have never heard of it or never experienced its richness and beauty. I pray that as things change, as they inevitably do with time, the Catholic Church recognizes and acts to preserve its two "Lungs". Our ancient traditions and ways of worship need to continue to be practiced and taught to all Christians so that the Universal Church can continue to grow and serve the Lord and His people.
I would love to hear from other Rites on this topic.

Tim,

The Ruthenian pastor who claimed an inability to administer the Mysteries of Initiation to your daughter was way off base. Under either Code of Canon Law, a priest may administer those Mysteries to any member of the faithful of another sui iuris Church in the absence of a parish and priest of the person's own ritual Church. It is required only that he document in the Sacramental Register the Church to which the individual is ascribed (as a practical matter, he should also afford notice to the individual's own parish, if any, or to the appropriate canonical jurisdiction of the individual's ritual Church).

That a presbyter of any EC Church sui iuris declined to afford the Mysteries to a member of another such Church is particularly egregious.

As to positions in the parish structure that you could not occupy, it's a mixed bag. If we're talking about parish council seats, I can see an argument that those who are not 'enrolled' in or 'registered members' of a parish shouldn't occupy those. If we're discussing being a server, a member of a choir, etc, it flies in the face of reason.

Many years,

Neil

The term 'bi-ritual mission' has been tossed about a few times in this thread and I think needs some definition if all are to be on the same page - because I don't think all are using the term in the same sense.

Firstly, there isn't any such formally designated entity.

That said, there are several temples which formally serve faithful of more than one Church sui iuris - and they come in varying forms. The most obvious are those in which a bi-ritual presbyter serves both communities (one Latin, one Eastern or Oriental) out of a single edifice.

Keep in mind that 'bi-ritual' refers to two distinct Rites and some of what is being described above would be more appropriately styled as 'bi-ecclesial', referring to two distinct Churches of the same Rite.

The only example of a formal bi-ecclesial temple which comes to my mind immediately is in El Segundo, CA, where St Andrew Russian Greek-Catholic Church and St Paul Melkite Greek-Catholic Mission share a temple and are both pastored by Father Archimandrite Alexei Smith, a priest ordained for the service of the Russians, though incardinated in the Melkite Eparchy. While I am certain that many parish activities are held in common, the Divine Liturgy is served separately for the two congregations of faithful.

Obvious examples of bi-ritual temples (putting aside instances in which an Eastern or Oriental congregation rents or meets at a Latin temple) include:

St Joseph Mission in Seattle, WA, the parish of our forum brother, Ghosty. Opened as a mission of the Eparchy of Our Lady of Lebanon in Los Angeles of the Maronites, it was transferred to the Eparchy of Newton of the Melkites by agreement of the two hierarchs. At the time, as memory serves, the decision was related to the availability of a presbyter to staff it. The mission continues, however, to formally serve both the Maronite and Melkite communities in Seattle. Ghosty can speak to the question directly, but I believe that only the Byzantine Divine Liturgy is routinely served - with the Maronite Service of the Divine & Holy Mysteries served only occasionally (although I seem to remember that Maronite Feasts and Saints re regularly commemorated).

In Framingham, MA, a single (bi-ritual) priest serves both St Thomas the Apostle Syro-Malabar Catholic Mission & St Jeremiah (Latin) Community, which utilize the same temple under agreement of the two hierarchs. Here, the two communities worship separately.

The same is true of Father Chrysostom Frank's St Elizabeth of Hungary (Latin) Parish and the Russian Greek-Catholic Community of Ss Cyril & Methodius in Denver.

There are others as well - not a lot, but they exist.

However, what seems to be the focus of the discussion here are instances in which a parish or mission congregation consists of Eastern Catholics of different Byzantine Churches. Although I'm not going to suggest that it's commonplace, I suspect it's not likely as rare an instance as some may be suggesting, as our peoples find themselves in locales where one of our Churches is in place, but another is not.

I do think that it's more likely to happen among faithful of Churches from the same Tradition than from mixed Traditions - but I can think of two Melkite parishes that number at least a few faithful from Churches of the Slav Tradition.

I recollect that one West Coast parish (Byzantine Ruthenian, as memory serves, but I won't swear that it isn't UGCC) makes a point on its website of the fact that its parish membership is comprised of Eastern Catholics of several different Byzantine Churches.

As well, St George Melkite in Birmingham, AL, the parish of our sister, Pani Rose, has historically served a congregation that includes Eastern Catholics of Churches other than the Melkites; the same has been true of St Ignatios of Antioch Melkite in Augusta, GA.

Many years,

Neil

Neil makes a very good point. Rather each individual Greek Catholic Church competing with the others for members and thus spreading themselves too thin, our hierarchs ought to coordinate their efforts and put resources behind just one mission in each particular area. If the Melkites are in there first, then the Ukrainians, Romanians, Ruthenians, et alia, should encourage all their faithful in that area to go to the Melkite mission. If the Ruthenians are in first, then everyone should go there.

We are too few in number to support multiple missions in most areas. Missions attracting a dozen or so people lack the critical mass to become self-sustaining parishes. But an area that has three or four missions, each serving a particular Church, combined to form just one mission, it would have a much better chance of survival.

It is a sad but sorry reality that over the years the Holy See has followed a divide et impera policy with regard to the Eastern Catholics, encouraging a "stovepipe communion" of each particular Church with the Holy See (i.e., parish--eparchy--metropolia or patriarchate--pope), to the detriment of a broader, horizontal communion among the Eastern Catholic Churches (especially those of the same rite). The chickens now come home to roost: at a time when all our Churches are under pressure, and active cooperation is becoming necessary for our survival, not only do we not have any experience in that direction, suspicion and parochialism mitigate against any form of cooperation. But cooperate we must or we will perish.

Please keep this topic going. For those like myself who do not have the knowledge to ask the right questions or approach the right people, I bless those of you who do. What can we all do? Where do we begin? How do we discuss this with our priests so that they do not feel unappreciated or feel that we are not grateful for what we still have. My bottom line is that my mission cannot provide me or my family the services that I feel I need to keep growing in faith. My time talent and treasure would/could be much more valuable in a larger and more vital community. I for one am going to approach members of my mission and urge them all to join this forum. Thank you all for your comments and ideas and please keep them coming. I am learning from all of you and it is good to know that others share my concerns and are looking for solutions that will preserve our Eastern Rite traditions. Has anyone had direct input from the hierarchy on these ideas?

In reference to the mission down in East TN: the Latin parish was hosting them--the Latin priests were trained in the Byzantine rite and had faculties under the Byzantine eparchy. When a Ukrainian priest became available the community chose to pack up and start over as a UGC mission. They now have their own priest and use a chapel at the Latin chancery.

If I used the term "bi ritual mission" I apologize for the confusion.

During my protestant days as an evangelist in the Assemblies of God I took classes on church planting. There are so many considerations and struggles planting and growing any community. When I was Antiochian Orthodox I helped start two missions and they were "pan-orthodox", that is, they avoided ethnic identity and had several converts from evangelical backgrounds.

The task is even more complicated for Eastern Catholics. Canon law can present obstacles--Melkites "belong" to their diocese regardless of what parish they go to; Ukrainians "belong" to their eparchies. As a convert ffrom the Antiochian Orthodox Church I canonically "belong" to the Melkites even though I came into the Catholic Church through the Ukrainian Eparchy of Chicago.

I know that Rome isw trying to respect all the sui juris churches, but in a pluralistic society like North America it sure does complicate things.

I'm not sure which reply to reply back to, so I'll just do it here

Mt. Charleston is west of the Las Vegas valley. I'm really not sure where the nearest Latin parish is.

The mission came from donated land and trailer facilities; I really don't know from where.

Both the (Latin) diocese of Las Vegas and the (Byzantine) Eparchy of Van Nuys are working on this same mission. It is a joint project.

Originally, our Byzantine priest was to have been assigned to the mission, and, if memory serves, it would have had a Saturday evening and Sunday morning service. I forget which was to have been the Divine Liturgy, and which the Mass.

It seems to have gone on hold for a while after he had to be assigned to our parish (hmm, that, and it took a long time for him too actually receive his Latin faculties . . .). My understanding is that a new priest (Byzantine) will be assigned to it, and also help with our parish (Byzantine) and Our Lady of Wisdom (Greco-Italo-Albanian) (and maybe part-time at a Latin parish; I don't know).

So, yes, this will be formally bi-ritual from the start, and it appears that it will be with a Byzantine priest with bi-ritual faculties.

hawk