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A Niall, a chara,
Trust an Irish Melkite to give us the recipe for vegetarian chicken soup! Talk about chutzpah!
Incognitus

Vie,

Father Joe Francavilla, the pastor at Holy Transfiguration Melkite parish [holytransfiguration.com] , is an old friend of mine from his days as the assistant at the Melkite Cathedral. I think you'd find the parish to be a wonderful temple in which to worship.

Many years,

Neil

Incognitus,

That's been said of me before

Many years,

Neil, who grew up in Jewish neighborhoods and realized, at an early age, that the culinary tastes of the Jews and the Irish both centered around potatoes, cabbage, turnips, and corned beef

Ladyhawke1017,

What part of Maryland did you move to? Are you Latin or Eastern? I've been here for a few years, and I know a number of good parishes in the area, both Latin and Eastern. If you want, I can point you to a few. Feel free to PM me if you wish to keep it private.

incognitus,

I'm sorry, but I still reject the idea that following one's Church's rules is "scruples" (your example is an unfortunate extreme that no one here is advocating, as that person is not following his or her own Church's rules). The Roman Church makes it clear that one must attend Mass on Sunday, but also makes it clear that this should be done only if possible. If one is sick or if no Mass is being said in the area, etc., then one is free from the obligation. But simply not feeling like going, or wanting to "relax" instead of going to Mass does not free one from one's obligations. Again, this is not scruples, it is obedience to one's legitimate spiritual authority, which every Christian is called to.

BTW, I was the one who challenged your "two free Sundays" rule, and I understand and respect you not having the time to prove it. However, it is so outside of any teaching from orthodox Roman moral theologians that I have read that I felt that I had to publicly challege it's veracity.

This is very true. I have been involved in my parish's evangelization committee, and one thing we do is to reach out to "Christmas and Easter Catholics". In talking with them, the number one reason (by far) that they do not attend Mass is due to "irregular" marriages, some of which are only irregular in their mind, not in the mind of the Church.

I do think that "obligations" are not what get many people to Mass on Sunday; however, I would not discount it completely either. I grew up Protestant, and in my experience, people just stopped going to Church on Sunday at the first sign of spiritual problems, and often never returned. Young people especially found no reason to attend regularly and often fell away completely from the faith after regular non-attendance. However, I know many Catholics who do not practice their faith during the week but go to Mass on Sundays (and make sure their kids attend Mass regularly as well) due to some built-in obligation (including much of my wife's family). I used to be offended by this - "How can such people go to Mass on Sundays? They're hypocrites! They don't really want to be here like I do!" Over time I began to remember the story of the pharisee and the publican, and I knew which one I was. I realized that I am also a hypocrite when I go, for I am a sinner no less than they. At least they are there, and can possibly receive God's grace for being there. So if an "obligation" got them there, that is okay, for God can use the graces of the Mass on them regardless of what got them to go.

A final post on this for a while.

I respect the Eastern outlook against "obligations" and attending Liturgy out of love, not obligation. I would like to give a Latin perspective of this, however.

When we get married, we are obligated to be faithful to our spouse. Most of us do this out of love - we can't conceive being unfaithful to our spouse because our love for them will simply not allow it. However, we are all fallen human beings, and sometimes we simply don't "feel" or even acknowledge this love. However, does this mean we can be unfaithful? Of course not. We are always "obligated" to be faithful, regardless of our love or feelings for our spouse. Even if our spouse is unfaithful to us, we are still obligated to be faithful to them. Our obligation should be fulfilled out of love, but the obligation is not nullified by a lack of love behind it.

We Latins look at our Sunday obligation in much the same way. We should be faithful to Christ by going to Mass on Sundays out of love. However, even if we do not acknowledge this love in our life, we are still called to be faithful to Christ by attending Mass. We see it as being unfaithful to Christ when we decide to put ourselves ahead of Christ on Sundays by missing Mass for illegitimate reasons.

Again, I'm not trying to say one perspective is better than another; I just wanted to relate how I view the Latin perspective on "obligations".

Dear Francis,

Actually, I think the views of some EC's against obligations is simply wrong-minded.

To me, the idea of contrasting the Latin CHurch's rules with the Byzantine Church's lack of rules is O.K. for purposes of simplistic differentiation between the two - but it is still wrong.

We, in fact, have NINE precepts of the Church, more than you have, although they are usually not given in prayerbooks.

St Peter Mohyla outlined them all in his Catechism and included the obligation to attend Divine Liturgy AND the Divine Praises on Sundays and Holy Days.

In other words, to fully participate in SUnday worship, we ought to attend Vespers the night before etc.

And Eastern Canon Law is very specific about rules, regulations and penances.

There is an Orthodox priest I know who upsets everyone as he places people who come to him in confession under "excommunication" (not to go to communion for a period of time) for certain sins.

And St Basil the Great did impose the penalty of excommunication for non-attendance at the Divine Liturgy for three consecutive Sundays in a row.

In addition, there is the rule that laity at Divine Liturgy must give a reason for not approaching Holy Communion . . . if the reason is not acceptable, they can be excommunicated, as much as a priest can for the same reason.

I'll let the canonists comment on this and other matters . . .

Alex

Francis, I understand what you are saying, but I tend to look at that a bit differently. I don't know whether it is a result of scholasticism, or Roman imperialism, but the Latin Church traditionally seems to have wanted to split hairs to the Nth degree. I would agree that since Vatican II it has gotten better and that it is not as common anymore. But I kind of view all those commandments under pain of sin to be because the Latin Church basically doesn't trust its people to do the right thing. It's like "we dont' trust you, so we'll hold this stick over your head and threaten to beat you with it if you don't do what's right." I don't want to seem harsh and this is certainly not a personal attack on your position. But those "under pain of sin" requirements do seem to come across that way at times. I don't think you can threaten people into Sunday worship. With the numbers who stay home these days, it's pretty clear that strategy doesn't work. People just don't respond to that medieval mindset anymore. I am all for playing up public worship of God as the way to show Him you really love Him. With all the time all of us spend on ourselves during the week, giving God a little time on Sunday is not much for God to ask of us.

A Niall, a chara,
What? no pastrami?

Incognitus (the scrupulously anti-scrupe)

But wasn't St Peter Mohyla VERY influenced by Latin Counter-Reformation theology and practice, such as "numbering" the Mysteries??? His emphasis on "obligation" might very well have been part of this influence.
I remember Archbishop +Joseph (Raya) in a homily asking us "why do we come to the Divine Liturgy?" it was not out of a legalistic "obligation" but "the Lover needs to be with His Beloved" BEAUTIFUL!!!!

Dear Brian,

Yes, he was . . .

But that didn't prevent the Orthodox Church from canonizing his Catechism as a legitimate expression of Orthodox faith and practice.

And have you read the Rudder lately?

Canonical law is something that pervades Orthodoxy.

And if you haven't been penanced according to the canons, then you are definitely missing out on a real experience .

Some Orthodox saints criticized the view that Orthodox Christians aren't bound by canons or that they don't need to know their canon laws and regulations.

Also, despite St Peter Mohyla's Western influences, he was also glorified an Orthodox Saint!

Alex

Dear Brian,

Of course, one can take canons to an extreme - and I have a friend who is a priest who certainly does!

But the fact remains that the Saints like St Nicodemus Aghioritis (who compiled the Rudder) and others who felt that Orthodox Christians should know well the rules of the Church.

I think it is unfair to the West to consider them to be legalistic when the East can be MORE in that way.

But certainly, the East has remained rather conservative (now don't walk away sulking!) you know what I mean, when it comes to maintaining the canons and the regular fasting disciplines etc.

To know the canons of the Councils and of the Church and to fulfill them to the best of one's ability is to be a faithful servant of Christ.

Alex

Francis...
We were Roman but have been attending an Eastern Church (Ruthenian) for the past three years and this coming Pascha will be able to request a formal change of church. The problem is not with the parishes we have looked into around here, the problem is that we have to get used to the differences. The very first Eastern parish we joined and the one where we, especially the kids, learned about Eastern Spirituality and Eastern Liturgy, had no latinizations at all. I can get used to pews, rosaries said during Liturgy and all the other things I have seen since moving up here (after all, coming from a Roman background, I have had to learn to adapt to things being different from one parish to the next). The problem is my three teens who are, as Alex calls such folks, MOTTOs. The oldest doesn't like what he sees around him, but, he is old enough to understand that the point of going to Church is to see the Lord and not keep score of what people are or aren't supposed to be doing. The middle one sees this all as one more reason why we shouldn't have made the move and as proof that we should move back. She cried thru the entire Liturgy Sunday...the younger one, well, his faith has been shaky for a while anyway, so this is probably just an excuse for him. The other problem is that there aren't as many teens at these new parishes as there was back home, so the kids are disappointed that they won't be making new friends. I'm thinking of trying Ephiphany in Annadale since I heard that there is a large active youth group there and maybe if the kids can meet some new young people and get involved again, the rest won't matter as much.

Vie