www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life Parish Life & Evangelization 2 steps foward and 20 back

Hi, and thanks for the welcome. I'm actually not new, though... just had to re-register because dumb-dumb me forgot my password and couldn't log in, ha... I used to be MizByz74.

Yeah, I go to a Ruthenian church, and thankfully praying the rosary before divine liturgy is about the only Latinization we have.

What do you think are the reasons for the continued use of Latinizations in our parishes?

I have a couple of ideas myself... I think the first reason is that in the past we adopted them to show Roman Catholics that we were indeed Catholic... and perhaps we still do. We don't want to scare away Roman Catholic visitors by seeming to be TOO different from the Latin Rite.
I've actually seen people come into my church, take one look around, and leave.

Another reason may be Roman "converts" to the Byzantine rite who "converted" only to get away from the craziness going on in the Latin Rite, and who have a fit if we don't do things the Latin way.

You know what's funny, though? A lot of RC churches are starting to employ the use of icons, ha. Talk about irony.

I used to know someone who prayed contantly for everyone she knew -- and she had very definite ideas about what she thought they ought to be doing with themselves, and so this is what she prayed for. In person, she was very condemning and judgemental, and I have an idea that this is kind of how she spoke to her conception of God. If you weren't doing what she thought you ought to be doing, well, then you were going to hell.

She also used to become very ill. She would get upset about how someone was misbehaving, start praying for them and get really sick. Bedridden, couldn't eat, sleep, in constant pain.

I had an opportunity to interview Dr. Larry Dossey, who has done a lot of research into prayer supporting wellness (recent reports questioning the efficacy of prayer for healing notwithstanding) and he said he's actually seen that happen more than once. People who pray negative things often seem to be struck by their own negativity.

This woman has long since passed on, and I hope that once she got to Heaven, Jesus got her straightened out about how to pray and what to pray for. Someone with that strong a will to pray could have been a great pleader for all people, but instead she got sucked back into her own unhappiness and judgement. So sad.

Note to the Liturgical police:
Pyrohy hath witnessed the rosary being prayed before Liturgy in an Orthodox church too, so what exactly is a latinization? Think of it as more of a small tradition, they change. As long as the deposit of Faith is in place you're doing good.

Latinisations are found not only in EC churches. What about the black vestments used by the Russians and some other Slavs? Their first use is traced back to the funeral of a tsar, and done in imitation on funerals in the West.

I find it odd that when latinisations are attacked people jump in with all sorts of evidence of "I've seen it here", "I've seen it there", "even some Orthodox do it", but when someone tries to defend the restoration of true eastern praxis and backs it up with "the EC church in ___ does this" this is usually dismissed as an abberation. Don't even think of using the Orthodox as evidence - "We're not Orthodox - we're Catholic, and don't do that".

I'll stop now before I *really* start to rant.

Lex orendi - lex credendi!

I think black vestments look great, especially with the silver trim.

Another kind I like is the very white vestments with flowers all over them. The only priest I ever saw wear them was in ACROD, I don't know how common it is.

+T+
Michael