How are educational opportunities set up in EC parishes?

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Do they follow the average RC model? We’ve been told by the priest to contact the ‘religious ed’ director, but she is very elusive. Everyone seems to be on summer hiatus, no groups or studies or learning opportunities, so the priest is forming his own study group. We’ve been studying on our own, as usual with casual guidance from RC friends. I guess we are their disciples. We are unfamiliar with this rite’s traditions and it seems they keep it to themselves.
 
It depends on the parish and/or diocese. Some are too small to sustain their own programs so they do joint activities with larger parishes and/or other Latin or Eastern Catholic Churches.

I personally follow a lot of what the Institute of Catholic Culture posts up, they have a good mix of Eastern and Latin teachers. Also, Fr. Thomas Loya (Ruthenian Catholic) and Fr. Anthony Messeh (Coptic Orthodox) are two of my favs; as well as Dr. Peter Kreeft, Fr. Robert Barron, and a few others.
 
I’m going to have to disagree with SyroMalankara’s recommendation of anything related to Fr. Anthony Messeh. It is a shame that things were allowed to go bad for so long, but the diocese in which this priest has served in D.C. is one of the ones that is under investigation by the committee recently formed by HH Pope Tawadros II to investigate long-standing complaints of Protestantization/Evangelicalism in the form of using Protestant materials as basis for sermons, Evangelical and other modern “methods” for attracting people and for keeping Coptic youth from going to Protestant churches (I wonder what the difference would be, but I anyway), singing protestant “Praise and Worship” songs or mixing them in with traditional hymns, and other things corrupting to our faith. This happened at St. Mark’s, the church he used to serve, and he apparently brought this ethos over to his new church. Similar things apparently also happen in Canada, where – lacking a bishop of their own – it is reported by God-loving Orthodox priests such as Fr. Athanasius Iskander of St. Mary’s in Kitchner, Ontario that there are churches in Toronto run on the Protestant models, with books offered by the likes of Rick Warren in place of true Orthodox guidance and sermons drawn on the same, that still call themselves Coptic Orthodox. For shame that anyone should put on a black turban spout such nonsense and poison the church with it. There is a special place in hell for those who mislead people in this manner.

May God sort this all out soon (it’s not like we have no Orthodox bishops in North America or elsewhere, but for whatever reason there are a few “trouble spots”; thank GOD I am under an Orthodox bishop, HG Bishop Youssef, who has written against the kind of nonsense spread in the D.C. area and elsewhere by well-meaning but wrong people), but in the meantime, stay away from Fr. Anthony Messeh and the other Protestantizing priests people unwisely receive as abounas.
 
Casilda said:
Do they follow the average RC model? We’ve been told by the priest to contact the ‘religious ed’ director, but she is very elusive. Everyone seems to be on summer hiatus, no groups or studies or learning opportunities, so the priest is forming his own study group. We’ve been studying on our own, as usual with casual guidance from RC friends. I guess we are their disciples. We are unfamiliar with this rite’s traditions and it seems they keep it to themselves.
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You will not find anyone to instruct you in a Maronite parish during summer. Usually there’s mass exodus and no one goes to church during the summer. Additionally, during the course of the year that isn’t summer few are interested in what the traditions of the Maronite Church actually are. Chances are you will be taught from the error-filled workbooks they have (which to anyone well-learned in any liturgical tradition they would seem suspicious, even if they are not learned in the Syriac tradition).
 
MorEphrem said:
You will not find anyone to instruct you in a Maronite parish during summer. Usually there’s mass exodus and no one goes to church during the summer. Additionally, during the course of the year that isn’t summer few are interested in what the traditions of the Maronite Church actually are. Chances are you will be taught from the error-filled workbooks they have (which to anyone well-learned in any liturgical tradition they would seem suspicious, even if they are not learned in the Syriac tradition).
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:confused: so its by is osmosis? You can only be Maronite Eastern Catholic if you were born into it and learned it from your forebears. Where does that leave converts? Didn’t Jesus say go out and make disciples, not leave them to their own devices?
 
dzheremi said:
I’m going to have to disagree with SyroMalankara’s recommendation of anything related to Fr. Anthony Messeh. It is a shame that things were allowed to go bad for so long, but the diocese in which this priest has served in D.C. is one of the ones that is under investigation by the committee recently formed by HH Pope Tawadros II to investigate long-standing complaints of Protestantization/Evangelicalism in the form of using Protestant materials as basis for sermons, Evangelical and other modern “methods” for attracting people and for keeping Coptic youth from going to Protestant churches (I wonder what the difference would be, but I anyway), singing protestant “Praise and Worship” songs or mixing them in with traditional hymns, and other things corrupting to our faith. This happened at St. Mark’s, the church he used to serve, and he apparently brought this ethos over to his new church. Similar things apparently also happen in Canada, where – lacking a bishop of their own – it is reported by God-loving Orthodox priests such as Fr. Athanasius Iskander of St. Mary’s in Kitchner, Ontario that there are churches in Toronto run on the Protestant models, with books offered by the likes of Rick Warren in place of true Orthodox guidance and sermons drawn on the same, that still call themselves Coptic Orthodox. For shame that anyone should put on a black turban spout such nonsense and poison the church with it. There is a special place in hell for those who mislead people in this manner.

May God sort this all out soon (it’s not like we have no Orthodox bishops in North America or elsewhere, but for whatever reason there are a few “trouble spots”; thank GOD I am under an Orthodox bishop, HG Bishop Youssef, who has written against the kind of nonsense spread in the D.C. area and elsewhere by well-meaning but wrong people), but in the meantime, stay away from Fr. Anthony Messeh and the other Protestantizing priests people unwisely receive as abounas.
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I can’t speak for Fr. Anthony’s standing in the Coptic Orthodox Church as you have, I will say however, that Fr. Anthony’s messages - the one’s I’ve heard - although using some Warren/non-denominational powerpoints as a guide, are strictly, strictly Traditional. He points out in a non-confrontational way, where the Orthodox position is, in relation to Warren’s outline. For example, he’ll say “My wife and I read Purpose Driven Life together on Sat evening… and while we were preparing our children for Sunday Liturgy with evening prayers… etc…”
 
No. This is not why he is controversial in the COC (and I did not say anything regarding his official standing; I don’t believe it has changed, although he is viewed with suspicion in many corners, and rightfully so). Rather, as has been pointed out by HG Bishop Suriel of Melbourne and others whose dioceses aren’t under scrutiny for heterodox practices and belief, Fr. Anthony has actually lifted the content of sermons from Protestant sources, almost verbatim. It is not a matter of casual reference to reading something un-Orthodox, as though the Church enforces a “banned books” list.

I know he is worryingly quite popular with people who like his slick style and presentation, but that does not make him a good source from which to learn about the Coptic Orthodox Church. That’s my only point.
 
dzheremi said:
I know he is worryingly quite popular with people who like his slick style and presentation, but that does not make him a good source from which to learn about the Coptic Orthodox Church. That’s my only point.
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I’ve been to a couple Coptic Orthodox Churches in my neighborhood when Fr. Antony was invited as a guest speaker. The COC Youth invited some of the neighboring Oriental Orthodox sister Churches and I went with my Orthodox cousins and some priest friends.

I found the so-called Praise&Worship distasteful and ill-fitting, but assumed this was the organizers influence not the speaker; Fr. Anthony’s sermons were rich, they incorporated many of the Liturgical elements of the Coptic Orthodox Church but also the ‘contemporary’ elements and cultural references that were relateable; and this was fitting as the talks led to an invitation to the Coptic Divine Liturgy, held later in the month at a local Greek Orthodox Church. Again, this particular talk had guest clergy from the Syriac, Malankara, Armenian, and Ethiopian Churches present.

What is your opinion of Fr. Estephanos Rabban, of St. Barsaumo Syriac Orthodox Church in Toronto? He is generally very reverent in his Liturgy and his sermons are similar to Fr. Anthony. Some “troubling” sentences similar to protestant thought but overall, positive.
 
Of course his sermons would’ve included allusions to the Coptic liturgy. Father Anthony Messeh serves the Coptic liturgy, so he should know it and be able to reference it. That doesn’t make un-Orthodox ideas or practices Orthodox. In fact, that’s the problem – mixing Protestantism with Orthodoxy and still calling it Orthodoxy. It’s not. The bishops and priests who know better are all against this kind of thing that is happening in D.C., Toronto, certain “missionary” parishes in Africa, etc. That’s where a lot of the COC-internal conflict is coming from these days: People who want to say it’s okay that certain priests do these things (“they’re still abounas!”, as though we are Catholics and believe that once a priest always a priest; that’s not the traditional view, as the recent defrocking of Fr. Yuannis Zaki Sidrak and others has shown), and others who don’t think it’s okay. Again, I’m merely saying for anyone who might view this thread that although he has been recommended by name by someone outside of our church (you), he is not seen in a very good light by many inside of our church (and with good reason), including fellow priests and bishops who are wary of this style of priest. (And it does seem to be evolving into a distinct style or approach to life in the diaspora, hence we can locate it in a few well-known trouble spots; of course, I am of the opinion that this should make it easier to target and eliminate, like the cancer that it is, but it remains to be seen what will come out of the recent investigations, so I am reserving judgment until I hear something more definitive than “HG Bishop Youssef joined against this”, which is kind of the level where we’re at now; sometimes I have to remind myself that the COC is still very new in the West and many places in Subsaharan Africa, and that all churches go through some growing pains; it wasn’t long ago that the GOC were flirting with organs and pews and all kinds of things in America that you don’t see too much anymore these days, so hopefully the Coptic sojourn through its pluricentric forced identity crisis will be similarly brief and merciful.)

I don’t know the Syriac priest you mentioned, so I have no opinion on him. Priests who attempt to mix Protestantism with Orthodoxy should be disciplined, however, regardless of whatever particular church they belong to.
 
I don’t know anything about the returning to the lay state of Yuannis Zaki Sidrak, what was the cause and why was this the solution?
 
Fraud. Several people have accused him of taking donations from them but then using them for personal investments.
 
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