www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life The Christian East & West Our EC parish seeing new crop of RC refugees

Our parish is made up of mostly ethnic EC. There are a good 1/3 that are RC refugees, including myself. But the new class has only two former protestants and the rest are all RC. Almost seems like every week we get another.

Is anyone else seeing this trend?

When you're referring to Refugees, are you referring to those who are running from something? When I became Orthodox, I wasn't trying to run from anything. I know my parish has two inquirers, this weekend, one of them being 12 years of age - former Pentecostal.

Those that are "running from" rather than "coming to" will be running again, soon enough

hawk

I have made two faith transitions in my life.

When I was in the explorative stage of entering the Lutheran church, a sage older Pastor counseled me "don't run from, run to".

That served me well for about a quarter century. As things fell apart within my corner of the Lutheran world, that advice is what helped to propel me into Orthodoxy...there was nothing left in Protestantism to "run TO".

I ran joyfully to the Church which has required no Reformation.

Fairly similar to mine! Admittedly, I've had my share running into a few things, there and there (three month stint in Buddhism being one of them).

A refugee is one who flees amidst chaos, hoping to land in a safe place they can grow. That characterizes the RC that are exploring Eastern theology.

It's good they are exploring Eastern theology . . . the RC "refugees" we have up here tend to be only interested in the "Rite" only - the theology, they say, is or should be the same as that of their own traditional brand . . .

Alex

yeah...

IIRC, there have been past threads in which "refugee", or comparable terms, were blanketly applied to Roman-Rite Catholics moving Eastward.

Refugees are coming at us from all directions . . . it would seem.

Alex

An honest question, and one asked with a hope for a better understanding, is: how is one to understand the irony of a refugee running TO that which is 'in communion' with that FROM which they have fled. I've not been here on this site for awhile, so if answers to this honest question (not at all rhetorical) are found elsewhere in the forums, can someone please help direct me.

Kindest regards, dear brothers and sisters.

Ivanov

I don't even see communion as an issue here.

Some, for example, are bothered by a perceived lack of reverence in most RC parishes (e.g., the four song sandwich Mass), and find that reverence in an eastern liturgy.

Some are drawn to the theology, and the acceptance rather thinned for explanation.

These have no issue with communion.

hawk

Well, we could always stop saying that we're Catholic because we're in communion with the Latin Church, and start saying that the Latin Church is Catholic because they're in communion with us. (Although I have a feeling that it won't really catch on. )

A young couple we have coming into the Church now, were RC. He told Abouna, that in a dream he was told to go to St George. He knew nothimg about our church, and had not really heard of it. HIs girl lived in Tenn. Because of work. She has moved back because of the church, and they are coming in together.

Last Pascha, we had seven come into the church from all different walks.

Dear Hawk,
I am currently in an Orthodox parish, so I am referencing "communion" in a , perhaps, very different construct from yours. If it is primarily about a more reverent Liturgical construct, I understand that. Perhaps a need that is felt for a more reverent Liturgy is symptomatic of a deeper difficulty, i.e., what is at the root of the "lack of reverence" in that which they are leaving. I say this as one trying to understand (well beyond a kind of 'liturgical preference') the underpinnings of the contemporary Byzantine Catholic reality as flowing from its historical Eastern/Western patrimony and painful losses of communion (among the various hierarchies) over the centuries. (I have no beef with the 'sheep'... pardon the butchered metaphor). I am needing to understand, in a very thorough, supplicatory way if becoming a Byzantine Catholic would be God-pleasing as the path of salvation for myself and my family. I have been shallow and presumptuous in my attempts at this understanding in the past. I hope this is not the case now. What is helping to propel me into this path again, is what I understand at present about the life of + Catherine Doherty (herself a saintly 'bridge' between East/West by a pure providence), and the model of community/discipleship found in Madonna House.

Does anyone know of particular threads on this forum that can address this desire to understand more "educationally"? My journey through protestantism, Roman Catholicism and Orthodoxy covers 64 years at this juncture. I have no axe to grind. What good is an axe when all around is just sawdust?

Sincerely,

Ivanov