Question on Terminology-Greek catholic

[boar2roar]

This is mainly a question for eastern catholics who live in areas where they are minorities. When you fill out forms, a census, or any other type of documentation what do you self identify as your religion? A lot of the individual options aren’t covered in the forms though greek catholic is often included so is that the religious option that eastern Catholics typically mark down or is that only used by specific subgroups of eastern Catholics?

 

[ByzCathCantor]

This is mainly a question for eastern catholics who live in areas where they are minorities. When you fill out forms, a census, or any other type of documentation what do you self identify as your religion? A lot of the individual options aren’t covered in the forms though greek catholic is often included so is that the religious option that eastern Catholics typically mark down or is that only used by specific subgroups of eastern Catholics?

The term “Greek Catholic” was once in common use to refer to Particular Catholic Churches of the Byzantine Rite and members of their congregations. However, it was believed that this caused some confusion, inferring that all of these Churches were of Greek ethnicity. It is more common now to use the term “Byzantine Catholic”, with some reference to the particular tradition (e.g. Byzantine - Melkite or Byzantine - Ruthenian). The largest of the Byzantine Rite Churches, the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church (UGCC) retained the use of “Greek”, as their historical ethnic origin is also clearly given. That said, if any of us “Byzantine” were responding to a survey that had “Greek Catholic” as the nearest best choice, we would select that option. If Roman Catholic were the only “Catholic” option, we would likely use that.

 

[GM_2013]

This is mainly a question for eastern catholics who live in areas where they are minorities. When you fill out forms, a census, or any other type of documentation what do you self identify as your religion? A lot of the individual options aren’t covered in the forms though greek catholic is often included so is that the religious option that eastern Catholics typically mark down or is that only used by specific subgroups of eastern Catholics?

I always answer Roman Catholic for the census in my country. They don’t have an option for “Eastern Catholics”. The only Eastern option they have is for Orthodox faithful. So it is Roman Catholic for me.