www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life Parish Life & Evangelization We need an Eastern Catholic website!

Light of the East, in case people are wondering, still, has been put on Catholic Radio International, now.

God bless Father Tom, but aren't there any other priests, bishops, etc. with anything to say about the faith? We seem to be lacking in this missionary spirit to teach according to our faith. I mean, sure, there's a letter or speech here and there but I can't find anything sustained to get the message out. As I said before, God chose fishermen (mostly) because fishermen seeks out the fish. They do not sit in one spot hoping for the fish to come to them (talking about commercial fishermen here like Peter was, not casual, Saturday afternoon in Summertime fishing at the lake).

There are plenty of Byzantine Catholic websites. Brother Phillip has his blog; Brothers Ric Ballard, and Nelson Chase have their blogs. I frequent Priest's Wife's blog, who's a wife of a Romanian Greek Catholic priest. She also put a more Eastern Catholic centric site, in Union With Rome.

See, that is the thing. Everyone seems to be doing their thing instead of a concerted effort. We always boast of the unity the papacy brings, yet we seem to be doing our own thing in our own little corner. Like I go to Ancient Faith and I already have access to a number of blogs and podcasts.

Unity in diversity, brother! Besides, I've been too tied to a communal infrastructure, lately (Linux, Android; the way I've been brought up in the Byzantine Tradition). I really like brother Ric Ballard's blog, because it's very intimate, within reason, without being too personal.

We can be united in diversity. We need to work together if we want to evangelize.

I'm getting this feeling that very few are even interested in evangelizing. Instead just focusing on the flock we already have now (not that it is a bad thing, but it shouldn't be the only thing!).

We evangelize by being a witness to the Gospel by how we live and by prayer.

Having a little stall set up every Sunday in the town square with some icons and leaflets on info of our Parish is a good idea. But thats all one can do really in a small town or large city even.

Well, my idea would be for all Eastern Catholic Churches around to hold an "Open House" Divine Liturgy for those from the Latin Rite to attend, so they can see what the Eastern Rite has to offer. That way they can join their Byzantine counterparts in prayer, and to enrich both Rites, and let everyone know how unity and diversity in the Catholic Church is much more than just "an hour in worship every Sunday" as it were. Teaching each others' traditions and the way we receive our Sacraments/Mysteries should really bring this feeling in unity amongst us quite well, I feel.

Well, a lot of people go around the internet nowadays. And they do some research. Like I said, I'm not opposed to this, but I can't see why we can't do the internet thing as well. Most people get their info from the internet anyways, why not have a place that will deliver that information effectively.



I've been trying to do this for years and no one is biting. Latin Catholics either love their rite too much to leave, or to poorly catechized to believe anything other than a Roman Catholic Church is actually Catholic.

This is true, ConstantineTG. There were a bunch of people on Youtube watching clips of the Divine Liturgy from Byzantine Catholic Churches, and everyone seems to think it's Orthodox, they'll completely deny that those clips are from a Catholic Church at all. That's another thing we'll need to get across to these people, is that even though we aren't Latin/Roman Catholic, we are just as much Catholic and governed by the Vatican as each other, just in our own traditions.

We've done it. Nobody comes. We've invited the RCIA classes from every church in the city to join us for Divine Liturgy for years. In all that time, we've had one group accept the invitation.

Its just that the intellectual side of things doesn't really have an effect on people especially from the internet point of view. It is much better to have them come to the Divine Liturgy and experience it all for themselves whether they understand it yet or not. To meet them face to face in the city square is the best approach. Internet can serve as a good tool, but it is such a minor tool to use compared to the more favourable physical and real world approach that is more beneficial in the long run.

bringing the person into becoming part of a real world Christian community is much more important. I'm just not sure the internet does that. It is important to have a site for each parish around the world, afterall it is how I found out about the UGCC in Dublin. I was searching for an Orthodox Church because I wanted to see what its all about and experience their liturgy and I came across Fr.Serge ( brian ) Kelleher and we became friends ever since.

But I was already interested in Christianity. People who are not yet interested in Christianity need the real world approach on the street with a pamphlet about the Church and what we do. Because people who are not interested? well...the last thing they are going to do is just sit at google and say to themselves ''oh I think I'll have a look at a byzantine website for the craic''. They just wont do it. Their thoughts about Christianity and their souls need to be provoked by the real world approach.

Amen

The only thing I disagree with your statement is that you seem to think this is a "one or the other" deal. It is not. We can do both and we should do both. In fact, any avenue for Evangelization we should do. Internet websites, blogs, facebook pages, door to door flyers, knocking, street booths, etc. Why focus on one thing and disregard the other? It doesn't matter if the website produces one convert per year, that is one more soul saved than if you didn't do the website.

No no no. Definitely do both. I'm expressing my opinion that internet evangelization is not as strong a tool as would be the real world approach. By all means try all avenues, but we need to pay more attention and energy into the real world on the street approach.