www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life The Christian East & West Should unity realistically return to first millenium standard?

Hey, Chrysostom did say that not many bishops would be saved, and this was the reason.

Not to mention the Revised Divine Liturgy.

Old habits are hard to break. Under the communists, they would shout out, as they were being dragged off to the GULAG, "Wait until Stalin hears about this!"

Frankly, I don't see why we would spend time and energy arguing about it one way or the other.

It is important that the Holy See walk the walk as well as talk the talk, otherwise it will have absolutely no credibility in its ecumenical discussions with the Orthodox Churches. Why would the Orthodox believe Rome when it says it does not desire to dominate them, when the Orthodox can see with their own eyes the subjugation of the Eastern Catholic Churches? Our job is to insist Rome deal with us in the manner it insists it wants to deal with the Orthodox.

Stuart, I think you might have misunderstood my last post. I didn't mean that abuses don't matter, but rather that it doesn't matter much whether those abuses come from the pope or from the Roman Curia.

I felt the exact same way.

I was under the impression that at some point after the introduction of the Pauline mass, it became obligatory to get the permission of somebody (priest, bishop?) in order to celebrate the old rite; and that permission was not forthcoming even for those that desired it. My impression is that desire for the old rite also became identified with resistance to the Pauline changes, and therefore discouraged even more.

So technically suppressed? Maybe not. Effectively suppressed, yes. Both apparently by the will of both the majority of the laity (as you note) and by the clergy.

This is all a tangent. Anyone feel free to correct me. It seems as though there was a desire to enact uniformity in this in my own opinion, as noted with the former desire to suppress the Greek Rite.

Makes sense.

I would add that for centuries it was the status quo in the West to have only one choice of liturgy (was a few notable exceptions, e.g. the use of the Ambrosian Rite in Milan). So I doubt that very many Catholics in the 60s were even thinking about the possibility of some parishes having the "new mass" and others having the "old mass". Rather, they were thinking in either-or terms, Should we keep the liturgy the same or change it, and if so what should the changes be?

The changes came along gradually during the period after the Vatican Council. I was witness to much of it. In my parish, when a new Missal came out with the latest vernacular and/or liturgical changes, all the old missals were collected and burned. At the time it was difficult to keep up and it seemed there was always a new Missal to replace an earlier edition. My pastor and his assistants told me that this was the instruction they were given--burn all the old books; that there would be no going back. I was given the 1962 parish altar missal, as it was about to hit the burning barrel. All the ritual books, breviaries, and anything related to the past went the same route. This doesn't even begin to tell the tale, however. The same end came to many of the ritual items needed: altar stones with relics intact, vestments, chalices (lots for sale on eBay even today).

In the late 1960s, a visiting pirest, newly ordained, related that one of his classmates had to ask permission to celebrate his First Mass using the 1962 Mass. It was a permission not easily obtained at the time. As time went on permission was not given and seminarians often found themselves in trouble if they were found to have any of the old books in theri possession. I've even heard stories of young priests using the old books during that period to celebrate the 1962 Mass at a side altar on a day when their pastor was away and finding themselves in trouble later.

Today when people talk about having the 1962 Mass, they find that a number of problems crop up. Most churches have had their altars positioned so that they cannot be used for this form; there are no altar stones with relics sealed in them; vestments are not available; books are hard to find; clergy have not had the training in the form and/or do not have the background in Latin to proceed.

Modern iconoclasm at its best. But forgive me, I've taken this thread far afield.

Bob

Christ is in our midst!!

I think the question posed by this thread is an interesting one and it probably will take a lot ov movement on all sides. The question I'd have is what period of the first millenium would we move toward? The fourth, fifth, sixth . . . century? Would it be in the time when Byzantium was not yet a big place? Would it involve the Coptic and Syriac patriarchs having the places instead of the Byzantine Chalcedonian patriarchs in those sees?

Understandably I think that the Christian East would prefer a situation where there would be none of the developments in the Latin West to contend with. But tht presents a new set of problems. What do we do with all the parts of the world where the Latin Church sent missionaries and are part of her? Maybe that's why Pope Benedict dropped "Patriarch of the West" from his titles. There are Latin churches in the Far East, India, Australia, and other places not necessarily part of the "West."

I understand Father Taft's comments in this area, too. He remarked in quotes posted in other threads in years past that all we are going to get is "communion," that is, some sort of way of living together that may mean parallel structures that co-exist alongside each other with eucharistic sharing--something as yet not fully explored but not some sort of monolithic thing. Maybe it would look like the Oriental Orthodox Churches--they're in communion, but function in some sort of autocephalous/autonomous way.

Bob

The seventh century would be the logical place, since it was the last time there was a concept of a unified Church and a unified Empire. By the middle of the seventh century, the Muslims had overrun the Middle East, North Africa and Spain, and what was left of Christendom was turning inward--the West becoming more oriented around Rome, the East around Constantinople. It was also at this time that the Byzantine Church became exclusively Greek, and ceased looking for ways of reintegrating the Cyrilians.

Assuming you mean that literally, I have to say "Wow".

Bob,
I completely agree with your question. That was my thought when this thread first appeared. It's truly a subject without a consensus. It's even more controversial than asking "What is the preferred English version of the Lord's Prayer?"

Many blessed years,
Fr Deacon Paul

KJV, of course.