apostolic church

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SacredHeartFan said:
He was indeed and he sat right next to the Pope. He gave the people his blessing and an Orthodox Deacon read read the Gospel in Greek and then a Roman Deacon went and read it back in latin. He even kissed the alter with Pope Benedict at the begining of mass. I love the way that the Pope and the Patriarch were put on the same level as each other and not making the pope look more powerful. They walked side by side during the entrance and exit procession, and their chairs were exactly the same.

There is a re-play of the mass at 8:30 central time on EWTN.
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If you find any links or pictures to the event please post, I am immensely curious 🙂

You might like to start a thread in the non-Catholic or Traditional Catholic forum with the materials.

Thanks,
Michael
 
belgianwaffles9 said:
SacredHeartFan, i feel like lots of people brought up points that could confuse someone who is unfamiliar with Eastern Christianity, so i want to address some of those.

First, the Pope of Alexandria: The Bishop of Alexandria (who is the successor of St. Mark in the same way the Bishop of Rome is the successor of St. Peter, and the Bishop of Constantinople that of St. Andrew) is the Patrarich of the Coptic Orthodox Church, the remnant of Christian Egypt before the Islamic Arab invasions. The Patriarch of Alexander uses the title “pope,” meaning “father.” It is an honorific title; it does not mean that the Copts “have their own pope” to replace Rome’s. It just means that Copts and Romans ended up using the same honorary title. Either could easily be called something else without changing who they are or what they do. In fact, the Pope of Alexandria used the title far earlier than the Pope of Rome did.

On Eastern Priests concelebrating with Latins: As others have said, Eastern Orthodox clergy cannot concelebrate the Divine Liturgy (which is, of course, called “Mass” by us Roman Catholics) with Catholic clergy. The two churches are not in full communion. However, as the two churches continue to become closer, lots of times Orthodox and Catholic clergy will be guests at each others’ liturgies. Pope Benedict and Patriarch Bartholomew have brought this to a new level of visibility and pomp.

However, what you probably saw were Eastern Catholics, who are those Eastern or Oriental Christians who either never split away from Rome, or who returned to full communion after a schism. There is a group of Eastern Catholics for pretty much every type of Eastern Church not in communion with Rome. There are many Byzantine Catholics who celebrate the same liturgy, the same feast days, and wear the same vestments as the Eastern (Greek/Russian/etc) Orthodox. There are Coptic Catholics who celebrate identically to the Coptic Orthodox. There are Chaldean Catholics who celebrate pretty much identically to the Assyrian Christians.

Remember, the Catholic Church is made up of MANY churches in communion with the Bishop of Rome. The Roman Church is just one of many, 23 to be exact. Many have different heritages, rituals, and ways of expression Catholic beliefs. Any member of ONE of those churches can receive the sacraments from any other. So you could, for instance, go to Ukrain, and go to a Ukrainian Orthodox Church, and you could not receive the Eucharist because the Orthodox are not in full Communion with Rome. However, you could walk across the street to a Ukrainian Catholic church, where the liturgy would be identical in every way (except they pray for the Pope) and receive the Eucharist, because they are in full comunion with Rome.

If you see an Eastern Christian and a Western (Latin) Christian celebrating liturgy together, then the Eastern Christian is Eastern Catholic, not Eastern Orthodox.
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One recent item of interest. The Assyrian church recently came into full communion with The Catholic Church. I’m not sure if this makes a 24th Sui Juris Church or if they joined with the Chaldean Catholic Church.
 
Are you sure? I remember that it wasn’t the Assyrian Church, exactly, but that it was a group of Assyrian Christians that reunited with Rome.
 
SacredHeartFan said:
He was indeed and he sat right next to the Pope. He gave the people his blessing and an Orthodox Deacon read read the Gospel in Greek and then a Roman Deacon went and read it back in latin. He even kissed the alter with Pope Benedict at the begining of mass. I love the way that the Pope and the Patriarch were put on the same level as each other and not making the pope look more powerful. They walked side by side during the entrance and exit procession, and their chairs were exactly the same.

There is a re-play of the mass at 8:30 central time on EWTN.
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Thanks, SacredHeartFan. I caught some of it tonight.

An important point, relative to this discussion, was made by the voice-over announcer after the Prayer of the Faithful. After saying that it’s the end of the Liturgy of the Word, he mentioned that since the Catholic Church and the Orthodox Church aren’t in full communion, the Pope and Patriarch Bartholomew would not be concelebrating.

Blessings,
Peter.

P.S. For me, the best part was watching the two hierarchs recite the creed together.
 
Ignatius said:
One recent item of interest. The Assyrian church recently came into full communion with The Catholic Church. I’m not sure if this makes a 24th Sui Juris Church or if they joined with the Chaldean Catholic Church.
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A group of Assyrians, who follow an American bishop who was basically kicked out of the Assyrian Church joined the Chaldrean church.
Hesychios said:
If you find any links or pictures to the event please post, I am immensely curious 🙂

You might like to start a thread in the non-Catholic or Traditional Catholic forum with the materials.

Thanks,
Michael
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thenewliturgicalmovement.blogspot.com/

A great deal of pictures are there, a few posts back, of both the Mass and the vespers the night before, which Pope benedict XVI and Patriarch Bartholomew I were at.
 
Peter_J said:
Thanks, SacredHeartFan. I caught some of it tonight.

An important point, relative to this discussion, was made by the voice-over announcer after the Prayer of the Faithful. After saying that it’s the end of the Liturgy of the Word, he mentioned that since the Catholic Church and the Orthodox Church aren’t in full communion, the Pope and Patriarch Bartholomew would not be concelebrating.

Blessings,
Peter.

P.S. For me, the best part was watching the two hierarchs recite the creed together.
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The best part for me was seeing my uncle! He was invited to concelebrate because he went to the seminary with one of the Archbishops recieveing the palium.
 
NicPais83 said:
Eastern Christians, whether in Full-Communion with Rome or not are all valid clergy with valid Apostolic Succession.
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This may sound like hair-splitting, but not all Eastern Christians have valid apostolic succession. Eastern-rite Lutherans, for example, don’t. (Granted, there are very few of them.)

Conversely, there are some non-Catholic Western Christians that do have valid apostolic succession, such as the PNCC.
 
belgianwaffles9 said:
A great deal of pictures are there, a few posts back, of both the Mass and the vespers the night before, which Pope Benedict XVI and Patriarch Bartholomew I were at.
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After looking at the pictures, it is clear the Patriarch was not vested, neither was the deacon.

This accords with what has been posted here as the voice-over stating that there could be no concelebration.

However I am a bit surprised that they were as involved as they were.
 
Hi Peter,
Peter_J said:
This may sound like hair-splitting, but not all Eastern Christians have valid apostolic succession. Eastern-rite Lutherans, for example, don’t. (Granted, there are very few of them.)

Conversely, there are some non-Catholic Western Christians that do have valid apostolic succession, such as the PNCC.
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All this, of course, according to the western understanding of Apostolic succession.
 
Hesychios said:
Hi Peter, All this, of course, according to the western understanding of Apostolic succession.
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Well this is a Catholic website. 🙂

But I think even you’ll agree with my underlying point – namely, that there’s no intrinsic reason why a Christian group without valid apostolic succession couldn’t be Eastern (and conversely there’s no intrinsic reason why a Western Christian group couldn’t have valid apostolic succession).
 
Peter_J said:
Well this is a Catholic website. 🙂

But I think even you’ll agree with my underlying point – namely, that there’s no intrinsic reason why a Christian group without valid apostolic succession couldn’t be Eastern (and conversely there’s no intrinsic reason why a Western Christian group couldn’t have valid apostolic succession).
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I think that if there are Lutherans who have taken to the Liturgy of Saint John Chrysostom (something I came across once before, a small group) but they are organized like modern Lutherans everywhere else, they have people they call bishops who would not be mistaken for real bishops by anyone, not a chance. They are elected for temporary terms as administrators and do not, as far as I know, have any unique sacramental or teaching functions. (I think the major exception to this would possibly be the Swedish bishops.)

As I understand it there were also some Presbyterian missionaries in Canada who preyed upon the Greek Catholic and Orthodox immigrants, even erecting iconostasis in their chapels (I can’t imagine how they got away with it). These people (Presbyterians) do not pretend to have bishops whatsoever. We might just as well not waste time speculating.

I do not regard these as originating in the east, but if we agree for arguments sake that they are present among “eastern” Christians we need to also agree that their theology is nothing remotely eastern, especially deriving from Luther and Calvin.

At least with Catholic bishops in communion with the church at Rome, we Orthodox carry a lot of hope and respect. Just as with bishops of the Oriental churches and the Church of the East, our theological disputes notwithstanding.

Michael
 
Hesychios said:
After looking at the pictures, it is clear the Patriarch was not vested, neither was the deacon.

This accords with what has been posted here as the voice-over stating that there could be no concelebration.

However I am a bit surprised that they were as involved as they were.
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Quite right about the vestments.

I was also surprised, i suppose at how involved he was. But i think it was a good way to underscore how Roman Catholics understand the Eastern Church: The Eastern Orthodox are, most of us believe, the SAME church as us, theres just an internal split. Which is different than saying we are two seperate churches out of communion, which is how we feel about protestants. So that is why the Easterns could particpate to the extent they did, i suppose. I would never be okay with seeing a Lutheran or Anglican have that type of role at any Mass. But I’m okay with the Eastern orthodox doing it. And Patriarch Bartholomew seems to be the Eastern Patriarch most friendly towards Rome. Which is good, because at least symbolically, he’s the leader. If only he could get Moscow on board, we could be reunified before i die. 😉

And how about the Pope reciting the original Nicene Creed in excellent greek, in tandem with the Patriarch?
Hesychios said:
Hi Peter, All this, of course, according to the western understanding of Apostolic succession.
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What is different between the Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic understanding of Apostolic Succession. Is there any group which the East believe has valid succesion which the West believes does not? Or vice versa?
 
belgianwaffles9 said:
What is different between the Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic understanding of Apostolic Succession. Is there any group which the East believe has valid succesion which the West believes does not? Or vice versa?
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See Page 2 of “Russian Orthodox Reject Inter-Confessional Worship”.
 
I have never quite understood this myself, but i think i finally am getting it, Now i am Roman Catholic, which means we go strictly by the Pope. Now I never understood the eastern and western. This is so mind blowing, there are so many Catholic Churchs, and the way i understand it some are in full union with the Pope and some arent. Its that right? Its just so complicated for me i dont know why. And one goes by latin and one greek right? Sorry for my ignorance.
 
belgianwaffles9 said:
What is different between the Eastern Orthodox and Roman Catholic understanding of Apostolic Succession. Is there any group which the East believe has valid succesion which the West believes does not? Or vice versa?
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Not wishing to be contentious about it at all, I can only say that the notion of Apostolic succession being separated from the church and from the teaching of true doctrine is a western idea.

Thus, there is no way that Anglican bishops and priests can get recognition of their orders (from Orthodox) because they have Old Catholic bishops in their lineage. It does not matter, they are out of the church and are not Orthodox bishops. What they may actually be is not known.
 
Hesychios said:
Not wishing to be contentious about it at all, I can only say that the notion of Apostolic succession being separated from the church and from the teaching of true doctrine is a western idea.

Thus, there is no way that Anglican bishops and priests can get recognition of their orders (from Orthodox) because they have Old Catholic bishops in their lineage. It does not matter, they are out of the church and are not Orthodox bishops. What they may actually be is not known.
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Theres some Catholics who would agree with you, considering the ordinations to be invalid somewhere along the line because there was not proper intent, or form, etc etc.
rinnie said:
I have never quite understood this myself, but i think i finally am getting it, Now i am Roman Catholic, which means we go strictly by the Pope. Now I never understood the eastern and western. This is so mind blowing, there are so many Catholic Churchs, and the way i understand it some are in full union with the Pope and some arent. Its that right? Its just so complicated for me i dont know why. And one goes by latin and one greek right? Sorry for my ignorance.
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Not quite… almost.

All CATHOLIC churches are in union with Rome, all 23 of them; the Roman Catholic Church, the Ukranian Catholic Church, the Melkite Catholic Church etc, etc, on and on and on…

However, there are other groups that split off from the Church at various stages in history: (1) The **Assyrian Church of the East **split off because it did not recognize the condemnation of Nestorius. (2) The Coptic, Armenian, and some Syrian groups split off after the Council of Chalcedon over Christological disagreements, becoming known as the Oriental Orthodox. (3) After the Great Schism of 1054, many eastern churches split off, becoming the Eastern Orthodox Church, made up of various independant (autocephalous) and semi-independant national churches all in communion with eachother. That leaves (4) the **Roman Catholic Church **(in the west) and various **Eastern Catholic Churches **that either never split off (the Maronites), or who returned to communion with the pope (Coptic Catholic, Chaldean Catholic, Ukranian Catholic etc etc).

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eastern_Catholic_Churches

As for the languages, many are used. Each Church uses a Rite, or possibly a few different rites. A rite is a way of doing things, the set of rules for how to run ceremonies and worship. in The Roman Catholic Church, we have the Roman Rite (Ordinary form, and the Extraordinary form, which might be called the Tridentine Rite), the Ambrosian Rite of Milan, the almost defunct Mozarabic Rite of Toledo, and various rites for monastic orders such as the Domenicans. There also were other ites which are extinct, such as the Gallican rite. It might be said that these are all rites of the “Roman” family tree of rites.

There are also various rites from other “family trees” such as
Antiochian (syrian), Alexandrian (coptic/egyptian), and Byzantine.

Many churches use the same rites in different langauges.
 
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