Ok. I'm in.

[crazzeto]

After a lot of time and thought on the subject. I’ve decided to become an Eastern Catholic.

I would like to thank the people who have responded to some my posts and answered some of my questions. It has helped me a lot. I’ve been in a very awkward state the last 6 months trying to decide whether to become an EC or remain in the OC. I think I’ve focused too much on church politics and the trivial issues that separate instead of focusing on Christ. May God forgive me for that.

While I love eastern spirituality and the liturgy, I haven’t seen a valid argument for being separated from the Pope and the Roman Church. Therefore I am “converting”. (If that’s what you want to call it.)

God bless you all, and thanks for your help.

I didn’t help in anyway, but regardless congratulations!

 

[CopticChristian]

I was referring to some Roman Catholic traditionalists who come here and accuse Eastern Catholics of not being Catholic enough. They usually criticize their use of the Nicene Creed without the filioque, view of the Pope as excercising his authority collegially, and not using certain Latin theological formulae. I agree with you that it’s ridiculous, but it’s something I’ve seen quite often here.

This is humorous to me. If you go to spain or mexico the creed is in Spanish, in France it is in French, in the East it is in Greek and the creed contains no filioque and the Magesterium says it is OK. The Latin to english translation produces the filioque. This criticizm is ignorance.

The Pope is the Pope. He is the pastor of the Church.

Theologic formulas are formulas

What is Catholic enough mean? This I would ask for as to definition prior to entering into any discussion. Shall we measure the Catholicity of the Apostle Mark, Clement,Athanasius and St. Anthony? They emanate from the Coptic Tradition.

 

[kevjminn]

kevjminn
I haven’t had much time to post lately and barely keeping up with a couple of the threads here and the next two days will be wonderfully busy. So, lest I wait until Tuesday to post I’ll say as quickly as I can a few things because I have found this thread especailly poignant personally.

I love being Catholic. And… at the same time I feel a sadness when someone has to make this choice which you are making to leave Holy Orthodoxy in order to be in communion with the Catholic Church. I am reminded of how we ECs were given the choice by the Soviet regime of becoming Orthodox or Latin Catholics when our Churches were taken away from us during the Communist era. I feel a sadness that I am not in communion with the Russian Orthodox parish I’ve grown close to.

You’ve mentioned the DL at the Ruthenian Church you’ve gone to is much shorter than at your Orthodox parish. Do the Ruthenian Churches you have access to there celebrate Vespers and festal vigils which I assume your Orthodox Church does?

In my case we follow the OCA liturgy in my EC parish, so it’s pretty much the same in my parish as when I go to the Orthodox Church I do go to at times. However, my EC parish hasn’t been able to celebrate Vespers and most festal vigils so I go to the Orthodox for that, as do other parishioners from my church. My life as an EC would be VERY different without the option of the fuller calendar of services I have by going for these to the Orthodox. Perhaps that isn’t an issue for you. I’d think it could be difficult to go back to your Orthodox parish for services as a Catholic.

I’m grateful for others here who have made the change into the Catholic Church from Orthodoxy and are happy for that change. They can be of encouragement to you. I always feel this sadness myself when I hear of someone making this change.

One thing is for sure, we ECs have to really love our lives as ECs because we are the misunderstood step children as it were of both the Catholic Church and Holy Orthodoxy…

There’s no vespers at the EC parish. That’s one of the things that’s disappointing. They do the festal vigils though. My old parish was OCA. So I guess they’ll be some adjustments.

 

[kevjminn]

Well, we are on the Eastern Catholic subforum of a Catholic site so I am not going to just sit and play dead and agree with this about the largest Eastern Catholic Church in the world to which I belong. The fact is today the most “political” Church in the former Soviet Empire is the exact Church to which the poster Volodymyr belongs. The said poster’s appellation is “Ukrainian Orthodox” but his church is thoroughly subject to Moscow, the Kremlin, and the Russian Orthodox Patriarch - the dominant position in Volodymyr’s Church is to laugh and belittle things Ukrainian (language, culture - which said poster has done before) and propagate Putin’s neo-imperialism as much as it is about a Christian message. When the Moscow Patriarch visits his Ukrainian colony, he doesn’t speak of the need to confront the rampant, immoral corruption decaying Russian and Ukrainian society. He tells Ukrainians they are Russian and not to join NATO while, unlike today’s Ukrainian Catholic hierarchy, says nothing about the utter immoral lawlessness of the authorities ruling the Kremlin or the thug ruling Ukraine. (small wonder as today’s Moscow Patriarch Kirill was involved with the cigarette and booze trade inside Russia as was mentioned in the venerable Economist journal).

In Ukraine, the Ukrainian Catholic prelates are forbidden from seeking political office. Not so for the Russian Orthodox which is why the Metropolitan of Odesa in Volodymyr’s Church can belong to the local government and prevent 50,000 Ukrainian Catholics from building one church.

The current Patriarch of Moscow was already in cahoots with the Communist atheist Kremlin in 1972 when he was chosen to be the Russian Orthodox Church’s representative to the World Council of Churches which could only mean the KGB trusted him most. As former KGB officer and now defender of Russian democracy Oleg Kalugin writes in the latest issue of the “Journal of International Security Affairs”:

“Today’s Russia is ruled by a new triumvirate: the new generation of the KGB, the Russian Orthodox Church, and big business. In this equation, however, the KGB is the senior partner; the church, including the current patriarchate of Moscow (like all previous ones), is controlled by the KGB, while Russian big business is penetrated by it”

Kalugin would know. He risks his life telling the truth of the lawlessness of Putin - Putin’s party is called by many Russians the party of crooks and thieves and similarly in Ukraine the current ruler Yanukovych runs a coterie of crooks. The Russian Orthodox Patriarch will not criticize either. Indeed, he approves of ruthless dictators like Belarus’ Lukashenko who brutally crushes any democratic opposition.

So please, let’s be clear, we are on an Eastern Catholic site and the church with the biggest role in serving Caesar and the new KGB tsar is the Russian Orthodox Church which claims itself to be the largest Orthodox Church in the world. All this talk of kissing the Pope’s foot is ridiculous, especially when compared to having to kiss the ring of a Patriarch who worked and works hand in glove with the KGB and now FSB (Russian secret police) and who praises the thugs currently ruling Belarus, Ukraine and Russia - thugs who couldn’t care less for human dignity or rights. That’s why the head of the Russian Orthodox Church will never condemn the forcible torture and execution by Stalin and his secret police of the Ukrainian Catholic Church - indeed it is still held in high regard by the Russian Orthodox hierarchy which says something to me at least about its moral compass.

And to the OP, welcome.

I wasn’t going to get involved but all this trush about having to kiss the Pope’s foot coming from someone who belongs to a thoroughly politicized church is too much for me, and that on an Eastern Catholic forum./QUOTE

The nationalism in some OC is probably the biggest downside for me personally.
I also don’t understand why people have such reverence for their patriarch and bishops, but absolutely refuse to show any for the Pope? I just don’t get it.

 

[Alexander_Roman]

Nationalism or “cultural pride” is something that exists in Roman Catholicism and the
EC Churches as well. Poland is a Catholic country but very patriotic and nationalistic (half my family is Polish and so I know this well!).

In the East, however, it was the Church (in Egypt, Greece, Armenia, Ukraine etc.) that was the only institution which promoted not only the particular religious culture of the people, but also the national culture and their Liturgy, as Donald Attwater once wrote, is where their religious/cultural identity is most fully expressed (and he was absolutely correct).

Without the Church and her New Martyrs, the nations and cultures of the East would be no more today. And even the secularists in those countries know that well enough.

For me, being in union/communion with the Pope is a way to “transcend” at one level that boundaries of religious-cultural focus which is my Church’s patrimony.

Alex

 

[fred_conty]

FYI Scott…we do NOT serve the Pope of Rome but are in COMMUNION with him.

Hi,
Actually, the pope is “The Servant of Servants” and serves you.