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Hi all-

Kind of new but old to this forum. I have been lurking for sometime, in and out.

I am looking for a bit of direction.

Backstory - I am a Roman Catholic cradle revert as of 5 or so years, I have found myself pushed to the margins in regards to my faith, by many in every diocese we have lived in, even some priests. My wife and I have chosen Latin Mass as our primary mode of continual conversion to become closer with Our Lord and grow in our Faith. We have decided that this is also how we can best bring our children up as well.

From what I understand, the Divine Liturgy holds a place in the faith life of the Eastern Rites, just as my wife and I have centered ours on the Latin Mass.

I have been intrigued by the Eastern Catholic Divine Liturgy for some time and I find that there is not a lot of knowledge within the Latin Church in regards to you all, and your liturgy.

The closest Divine Liturgy is a Ruthenian rite 2 hours away, currently we attend FSSP 1 hr and 45 mins away, so an extra 30 mins both ways isn't much.

When looking into attending, there was a sound bite of the Liturgy, in such I only heard the vernacular/English, chants, call and response type stuff.

My first of maybe many questions is, I thought the liturgy in the East was untouched, at least I have been told it remains intact in comparison to the dismantled roman rite after the unfortunate tinkerings mid-century of late. Wouldn't vernacular be a sign of change?

To be honest, I would appreciate much more greatly an ancient language as it connects to the millennial tradition of the Church, hence our finding our way to a TLM every week.

The second and further question would be, if indeed the Ruthenian Rite has been changed somewhat, and we in the Latin Rite would contend that that is a primary cause of what we could be seeing as general apostasy in our rite (post Vat II), are there any Byzcath Rites that have been fully retained, language and all?

Even further, if there have been changes to the liturgy in any way at all on the Eastern Side, is this a decision of the Rite, Eparchy or a decision made by local parish?

Thanks ahead of time! Hopefully I am being clear.

Welcome to the Byzcath Forum!



The Eastern Churches, Orthodox and Catholic, have an ancient tradition of using the vernacular. A number of changes that occurred in the Latin Church from the Second Vatican Council were changes encouraged at the Council by the heirarchs from the Eastern Churches- restoration of the "permanent" diaconate, restoration of the laity receiving Eucharist under both species, and Liturgy/Mass in the vernacular are three.


The Ruthenian [b]Church[/b] uses the Byzantine [b]Rite[/b] [en.wikipedia.org].

We have a parish in the local Latin Diocese which has been celebrating the Extraordinary Form of the Roman Rite continually, and daily, with permission from the local ordinary, since 1989, and an increasing number of other parishes serve it at least on Sundays. I have many friends who attend these and none of them claims "general apostasy" in the Roman Rite.


My parish uses service books of the Orthodox Church in America [oca.org], with permission of our local ordinary. I believe most Churches have their own Typikon, Liturgikon, various services books, approved by the bishop currently serving at the time they were first published, and approved for use by the current Eparch/Bishop