Am I catholic: Baptised orthodox (not confirmed), committed to and taking communion in Catholic Church > 20 years!

[Indihannahjones]

My husband was born in Romania, baptised and first communion in Romania as orthodox. Moved to UK aged 10, where he has only ever worshipped in the Catholic church. Believes in the sacraments as a Catholic and hence takes communion. Never formally confirmed as orthodox or Catholic.

As I understand it, this is acceptable from a Catholic standpoint as the belief in the sacrament is the same but represents a break with orthodoxy as they do not consider themselves part of Rome. On this basis he is no longer orthodox!

Can he consider himself a Catholic?

This is important for us as a family because we are bringing our children up in the Catholic church.
I am currently part of the RCIA program as baptised but never confirmed anglican.

I would appreciate informed responses and no inflammatory comments please.

 

[Fr.Charles_Grondin]

I find it odd that he did not receive confirmation. As far as I know it is standard practice in the Orthodox Church to administer all 3 sacraments of initiation (baptism, confirmation, communion) to infants.

However, because he was baptized Orthodox he is considered Orthodox. He needs to be officially received into the Catholic Church. I would recommend he sit down with his parish priest and discuss his situation. If he can obtain his sacramental records from the Orthodox Church that would be helpful in determining his situation. Since all the sacraments of the Orthodox are considered valid, if he was indeed confirmed in the Orthodox Church he would not need to receive confirmation in the Catholic Church. He would simply be received into the Church. If he did not receive Orthodox confirmation, then he would receive confirmation at his reception into the Catholic Church.

Because the Catholic and Orthodox Churches share the same sacramental theology and have very few differences, intercommunion is not a huge problem in situations such as this. I don’t think he’s done anything wrong by receiving communion in the Catholic Church based on his circumstances, but he should try and straighten out his situation by sitting down with his parish priest.