Just thinking of the topic of this thread. We do not know who goes to Hell. The only ones we know are in Heaven are those who have been stated to have been there with the authority of the Church.
Yeah. And if the Ethiopian Catholic Church venerate Pontius Pilate as a saint, that’s what they’re saying: He’s in heaven. According to their tradition, he made it. Is it every particular church’s tradition? Of course not. But I guess I don’t understand why you keep repeating “the authority of the Church”…which other church is appealed to in commemorating a particular person as a saint? We’re speaking of a purely Ethiopian tradition here. Does it need to have Rome’s stamp on it? And if that’s the case, why do any particular Eastern/Oriental Catholic churches have their own saints at all? Either you value local tradition and let it grow organically or you don’t, but it’s a little weird to separate things out this way, as though the Ethiopians who are recognized as being specifically Catholic are, well…not Catholic, because they have their own saints that Rome doesn’t share. Plenty of saints in your communion are venerated only by the Latin/Roman church, but I don’t think most ECCs or OCCs care about that one way or another.
Everything else is open for private opinion or private devotion. Oh, I guess I just do not understand all this east/west conflict with in the Catholic Church.
It’s not private opinion or private devotion if it is commemorated on their liturgical calendar (which we still don’t know, and I doubt we will find out).
Re: East/West conflict in the Catholic Church – you should try to understand it a bit better if you’re going to presume to tell other particular churches that their traditions are somehow lesser than your own (amounting to ‘private opinion’ even if they’re not). I would think that such an attitude does much to contribute to that East/West conflict. I can’t and won’t speak for your communion, but I do know that in the OO communion that the Ethiopian Catholics came from, we’re not hung up on such things. We in the COC don’t venerate St. Hripsime like the Tewahedo and the Armenians do, and the Armenians for their part don’t venerate HH St. Dioscoros like we and the Tewahedo do. We’ve lived with this for millennia.
It is one thing when dealing with liturgy and devotions to respect the individuality of each rite, or each person, for that matter. However, when we comes to matter of** fact**, what is and is true and is not true, I guess I believe that universality (the Catholic part) is our only sure norm, as opposed to provincial opinion.
Liturgy is most definitely a matter of fact. When we commemorate the Patriarchs or read from the Synaxarium in the liturgy, we are stating the
fact that these people are saints. The Catholicos of Armenia HH Karekin II could show up to our liturgy here in ABQ and we would still venerate, by name, our teacher St. Dioscoros during the commemoration of the Patriarchs. I imagine HH would have no problem with that, but even if he did, there’d be nothing he could do about it. The Orthodox Church is truly Catholic in that it is whole – the Church (no matter if it’s Coptic, Armenian, Ethiopian, etc.) in a given place
is the Church in that place and is considered to have all the authority needed to function according to its tradition without interference from anyone regardless of differences in liturgical form, calendar, language, etc. I respect the fact that this is not how the Roman Catholic communion apparently works, but it does create potential issues when the tradition of a given church draws the ire of others of a different church. The question of what can or should be done about that is beyond me; I only know that it doesn’t need to be this way in order to have a functioning church, so your appeal to the authority of the Catholic Church regarding what the Ethiopians do or don’t do seems odd. Aren’t these Ethiopian
Catholics, and in an RC context doesn’t that ecclesiastical affiliation give them all the authority that they need? After all, RCs love to tell the Orthodox that there is such unity under the Roman Pope…well, where is it now, when/if the Ethiopians want to preserve their unique veneration?
Even in this, I have not seen where the Ethiopian Catholic Church venerates Pontius Pilate. If they do not, there might be a reason for that. Just because they have similar traditions of other Ethiopian traditions, they also have one serious difference, and that difference has a major bearing on Truth.
What is the lesson here, exactly? That for the Ethiopian Catholics to be under Rome is not enough if the Latins do not like their traditions? I know you’re referring to your Pope when you talk about their “one serious difference”, but I don’t see how this makes any difference at all if they continue to venerate Pontius Pilate while still being union with Rome. Rome doesn’t set their calendar, does it?
This is the Catholic POV.
You might want to check with some of your fellow Catholics, particularly Orientals, before you present your own view as ‘the’ Catholic POV.
No, not all Churches set their own versions of truth and yet all remain correct. This is the gulf between the Catholic and the Orthodox mentality.
Hahaha. Hardly. There is indeed a wide gulf evidenced in your post, but I think it is more accurately described as the perennial gulf between non-Orientals who think that their way is the only way and Orientals themselves who are used to that song and dance, and are sick of it. In that, this Orthodox believer is 100% in accord with his Catholic friends.
By your wording, it would seem that the Ethiopian and Eritrean Catholic churches are somehow less “official” than their larger Latin counterpart. Hmm. Good to know that the Oriental Catholic Churches are lesser even to Eastern Catholics. Oh, wait. No. Not ‘good’. What’s the word? Gross. That’s it – gross. 
