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I can only speak from a Melkite perspective, but here goes...

TRANSFER: For us, Transfer of Ascription proceeds from within parish life rather than by contacting the respective Bishops in advance. I went to my parish priest after a couple of years of parish membership and he helped me with the process. My Transfer was finalized on our parish Feast Day about 6-7 months after I submitted my packet to the parish secretary.

VOCATIONS AND ORDINATION: Melkite men are called toward ordination from within the community rather than being entirely self-selecting. I suspect that the Seminarians and Readers in my parish spoke first with our parish priest about their interest, but it starts in the parish and proceeds from there to the Eparchy and seminary. We currently have about three Seminarians, four Readers, and one Deacon in our parish who are studying with the goal of ordination to the priesthood. We also have a Ukrainian subdeacon from Canada whose bishop has sent him to serve in our parish while he studies at Catholic U.

BISHOPS VISITING THE FLOCK: Our Bishop visits the parishes of the Eparchy regularly - at least once a year. We will have another shepherding visit from him in a few weeks. We will also have a visit from our Patriarch next year. He visited half the parishes in the Eparchy last year and plans to visit the other half in the coming year.

I don’t know if the issues the two of you are speaking of play out differently in the Ruthenian and Ukrainian churches, but as far as Transfer goes, the recommendation I’ve seen (and this includes from Ruthenians and Ukrainians) is to get involved in parish life and after at least year or more, speak with your priest about transferring.

I agree 100%.

Excellent choirs, a good priest and a parish that understands and loves Divine Liturgy is a fantastic outreach.

Practicing the Faith in God's intended way is attractive.

On the other hand, if the parish is full of despondent Latin Mass folks, who pray the rosary and do everything latin-style and who are only there because there isn't a good Latin Mass alternative.....this type of parish will not prosper, as they don't know who they are or why they're there.

The chancery is nearly 600 miles from our parish. Because of this great distance, bad pastors have free reign to really pull parishes down before any change takes place. .

Excellent choirs,..

My experience with the Ruthenians is that they have NO IDEA who they are.

In the 20th century, the Ruthenian Church was bullied by Latin bishops and caved in rather than standing for who they are supposed to be according to the Union of Brest.

There are a few hardy souls trying to be Orthodox,

And then there's the whole issue of being "Orthodox in Communion with Rome."

How does one do that and remain Orthodox in theology and praxis.

I still hear ECC's talk about indulgences and Purgatory, neither of which is Orthodox theologically.

How can you be "in communion" with that with which you do not agree, such as the various doctrines of the Latin Church which were invented after the schism of 1054?

A Failure of our Church: To effectively articulate why, as eastern, orthodox Christians we are, and why one should be Catholic – we, who are living (though perhaps rather imperfectly) the desired unity.

Since faith rests upon infallible truth, and since the contrary of a truth can never be demonstrated, it is clear that the arguments brought against faith cannot be demonstrations, but are difficulties that can be answered.

The term "in communion" speaks of a unity of mind and thought, and in theological thought, means that we share all doctrines in common.

This is precisely why Protestants aren't allowed to partake of the Eucharist, the very symbol of unity - because they don't have unity with our beliefs.

I believe there are 15 seminarians hardly a ghost town. We also recently received an Orthodox priest into our Archeparchy.

I am a revert to the Catholic faith from Evangelicalism. I returned to the Church about three years ago. Similar to this forum’s initiator, my father was Byzantine and my mother was Latin. I have been following this forum for about two years. This is my very first post. With that said, I have a question… The Latin Rite has RCIA. Do we Byzantines have anything remotely similar?

Distance is a factor but not an excuse. The bishop should especially know the presbyters, his brother priests (and deacons too), mindful that at his ordination, the presiding hierarch gave him the pastoral staff saying:

"Take the pastoral staff, that you may feed the flock of Christ entrusted to you; and may you be a staff and support to those who are obedient. But lead the disobedient and the wayward to correction in gentleness and to obedience and they shall continue in due submission."