Three western Churches?

[Fone_Bone_2001]

This for this answer it really helped. So the Latins who celebrate the Roman Rite are Roman Catholics. Does this mean Catholics who celebrate other Latin Rites are not?

Whether someone counts as a “Roman Catholic” or not is an entirely relative question, as the term itself is not one with any formal, accepted definition.

Our surrounding culture generally uses “Roman Catholic” to refer to any Catholic, regardless of which self-governing church one is subject to. Orthodox Christians also use the term “Roman Catholic” to refer to all Catholic Christians.

Many Catholics, especially on places like these forums, use “Roman Catholic” to mean Catholic Christians who are members of the Latin Church: i.e., all Latin Catholics. Thus the term “Roman Catholic” by this definition does not include Eastern Catholics.

So the vast majority of people probably *would *count Latin Catholics who celebrate other Latin rites as “Roman Catholics,” because of the ambiguity of the term. It’s not an official term; it means whatever people intend it to mean.

… the reason we are called Roman is because we are from Rome ( the Church was established in Rome from Peter ) …

Well, as I emphasized just above in this reply, the term “Roman Catholic” is not an official one and means whatever the one using it intends it to.

I personally - and this is just my opinion - feel it doesn’t make sense to say that all Latin Catholics are “called Roman … because we are from Rome.” I personally am not from Rome at all. As far as I know, I don’t have a smidgen of Italian ancestry at all. So I don’t feel Roman in any sense.

Of course, as a Catholic Christian, my particular church- i.e. my diocese, governed by my local bishop - is in communion with the Church of Rome, but I do not think that makes me Roman.

Of course, my diocese does obviously use the Roman Rite, so I guess in that sense most Latins could be called Roman.

 

[Fone_Bone_2001]

Dear brother YoungTradCath,

As you noticed, brother ConstantineTG gave a thumbs up to your statement. In another thread, he is claiming that the Western Catholic Church teaches that - let’s say - the Melkite Catholic Church is not a true Church in its full sense according to its teaching, but is merely “part of” the Catholic Church. A lot of Latin Catholics refer to the Eastern and Oriental Catholic Churches merely as “Rites,” and CTG claims that is because the Western Catholic Church teaches (not merely that there are Latin Catholics who believe this way, but that the Latin Catholic Church actually teaches) that Eastern and Oriental Catholic Churches are not true Churches, but merely “Rites.” Would you agree with brother ConstantineTG that the Latin Catholic Church teaches this?

Blessings,
Marduk

Are you sure he’s claiming that? With respect, I’d be very surprised at that, as it is an easily verifiable certainty that the Catholic Church not only regards the eastern Catholic churches as true churches, but even every diocese as a true particular church in the fullest sense.

It’s important that we do not emphasize any one of these uses of the word “church” to the point that we deny any of the others.

Exactly.

a very good question/statement.
is the Maronite Church a Rite of the Roman Catholic Church or a Church of it’s own?
(and part of the Catholic Church)?
the answer is yes and no and a thread on it’s own lol.

Well, whether it’s a church is easy and quick: yes, the Syriac Maronite Church of Antioch is a true autonomous church.

Whether there is such a thing as a “Maronite Rite” - that’s the one that deserves a thread of its own.

So how is the “One Church” achieved? Is each diocese a part of the One Church, ie. a piece? Per the two lung theory of our recent Popes, it means the one body of Christ has divisions within it coming together to form one body. Which means each Church is a piece of the whole instead of the whole by itself. So while each diocese is a Church unto itself, it is not complete if not in union with Rome and thus just a small piece of the body detached from the vital organ. Is this accurate?

Isn’t it true that every church is both whole by itself and a piece of the whole?

The necessity of union with Rome doesn’t negate or contradict the intrinsic wholeness of a particular Catholic church (diocese/eparchy). After all, if what we now know as the Church of Rome were, in its entirety, utterly obliterated - pope, cardinals, curia, and all - by a devastating nuclear attack or something, that wouldn’t magically make every Catholic diocese somehow not a part of the Catholic Church. It’s just that the bishops would have to meet to elect a new Supreme Pontiff to succeed Saint Peter, that’s all.

I imagine that many Latin Catholics aren’t aware of this teaching (unfortunately). The Church teaches, of course, that, as you say, each body of the faithful with a bishop is a true and proper church; that is, the faithful of each diocese (or equivalent) are the body and each bishop is the head. Constantine asked earlier if a diocese could be said to constitute the Church in its own right. I think in a sense it does. Catholic theology is very mystical and nuanced - often there is no simple “yes or no” or “either / or” answer. This is how I see it - just as Christ is said to be truly and fully present in each and every crumb of the Eucharistic Host, so is the Christ fully present in each and every body of the faithful under a bishop. The entire host is Christ: each crumb is Christ. The entire Church around the world is the Church: each diocese/eparchy is the Church. The Church is the mystical extension of the Incarnation - and as Christ is omnipresent, I do not think it a stretch to imagine that both the Church Universal and each local Church can be said to be His body. The Pope is Christ the Head, but so is each local bishop in a very real sense. Yet there is one body, not many, and one head, not many. It is a great mystery - as are so many teachings of our faith.

Wow. Best reply in the whole thread, hands down. Well said, twf.

 

[Fone_Bone_2001]

But isn’t it Roman Catholic teaching that the diocese apart from the Pope is not a true diocese? Therefore the existence of every diocese is dependent on the Pope, not just the diocese itself.

the proper jurisdiction they receive does not come to them directly from God, it comes directly from the Sovereign Pontiff to whom Christ gives it in a plenary manner

ewtn.com/library/THEOLOGY/chwordin3.htm

It comes from a section called: “The Pope’s Power Derived Immediately From Christ; That Of The Bishops, Through The Mediation Of The Pope”

So obviously this speaks of the Pope as some kind of super bishop who is above all bishops and the only one who has the divine authority to be a bishop. Doesn’t this disprove a Eucharistic model among the Churches in the Catholic Church? The understanding here is that a bishop is only a bishop if the Pope says he is a bishop, or if he is in communion with the Pope (which by itself is contradictory to the Sacramental theology of the RC Church that ordination is permanent and a schismatic bishop is still a bishop).

Further on that page, it says, “Their jurisdiction, although fully subordinated to that of the Sovereign Pontiff…”. Doesn’t this suggest that every diocese rightfully belongs to the Pope as well as the Local Ordinary? That part of the article continues to say that each bishop has rightful claim by divine law to their local jurisdiction, but it cannot be apart from the Pope. So in short, every diocese simply has two bishops.

What is that document? As twf explained on page 3, that sounds way off:

Pope St. Gregory the Great, whom the Latin Church honors as a Doctor and one of its greatest popes/theologians, argued very strongly against the notion of a “super” or “universal” bishop from whom all other bishops derive their power. It is true that the jurisdiction of bishops, at least in the Latin Church, is determined by the Pope or an Ecumenical Council, but the authority and dignity intrinsic to the office comes directly from Christ.

From the Catechism:
1558 “Episcopal consecration confers, together with the office of sanctifying, also the offices of teaching and ruling. . . . In fact . . . by the imposition of hands and through the words of the consecration, the grace of the Holy Spirit is given, and a sacred character is impressed in such wise that bishops, in an eminent and visible manner, take the place of Christ himself, teacher, shepherd, and priest, and act as his representative (in Eius persona agant).” 37 “By virtue, therefore, of the Holy Spirit who has been given to them, bishops have been constituted true and authentic teachers of the faith and have been made pontiffs and pastors.” 38

Note that consecration confers the offices of teaching and ruling - not the Pope.

1560 As Christ’s vicar, each bishop has the pastoral care of the particular Church entrusted to him, but at the same time he bears collegially with all his brothers in the episcopacy the solicitude for all the Churches: "Though each bishop is the lawful pastor only of the portion of the flock entrusted to his care, as a legitimate successor of the apostles he is, by divine institution and precept, responsible with the other bishops for the apostolic mission of the Church."41

Note that each bishop is Christ’s vicar.

895 "The power which they exercise personally in the name of Christ, is proper, ordinary, and immediate, although its exercise is ultimately controlled by the supreme authority of the Church."427 But the bishops should not be thought of as vicars of the Pope. His ordinary and immediate authority over the whole Church does not annul, but on the contrary confirms and defends that of the bishops. Their authority must be exercised in communion with the whole Church under the guidance of the Pope.

Their authority is immediate, meaning it does come directly from Christ. This is the teaching of the Church. Yes, the use of that authority is guided by the Pope, but it does not come from him. Does this mean that each diocese has two bishops? No - the supreme authority of the Church, referenced here, is elsewhere defined as the pope AND bishops in union with him - meaning that an ecumenical council is also an exercise of the supreme authority. Even in the Orthodox Churches, the local bishop, whose authority comes directly from Christ, is still subject to the authority of ecumenical councils.

When I receive Holy Communion, I am part of Christ and Christ is part of me; however, to remain part of Christ and His Church, I must be in communion with my local bishop. The local bishop receives his authority from Christ - he is part of Christ and Christ is part of him, but for him to remain fully incorporated into Christ and His Church he must be in full communion with the bishop of Rome, who represents the visible unity of the entire Church. As I said in an earlier post, it isn’t always a matter of either / or. Catholic theology is very nuanced and often the answer to a yes or no question is both.

 

[mardukm]

Are you sure he’s claiming that? With respect, I’d be very surprised at that, as it is an easily verifiable certainty that the Catholic Church not only regards the eastern Catholic churches as true churches, but even every diocese as a true particular church in the fullest sense.

Yes, that’s what he is exactly claiming. Besides that, he claims that no bishop has any real authority, except for the Pope. You can read about his claims here:

forums.catholic-questions.org/showthread.php?t=737943. It’s only still a little over 2 pages long, so it’s a short read.

He presents his pov as a question here in the Traditional Catholicism Forum, but elsewhere, he goes around presenting them as facts that he claims cannot be refuted. I’ve corrected him on his claims in other previous threads, but he never responds and just keeps repeating them elsewhere.

Blessings,
Marduk

 

[BVMFatima]

Whether someone counts as a “Roman Catholic” or not is an entirely relative question, as the term itself is not one with any formal, accepted definition.

Our surrounding culture generally uses “Roman Catholic” to refer to any Catholic, regardless of which self-governing church one is subject to. Orthodox Christians also use the term “Roman Catholic” to refer to all Catholic Christians.

Many Catholics, especially on places like these forums, use “Roman Catholic” to mean Catholic Christians who are members of the Latin Church: i.e., all Latin Catholics. Thus the term “Roman Catholic” by this definition does not include Eastern Catholics.

So the vast majority of people probably *would *count Latin Catholics who celebrate other Latin rites as “Roman Catholics,” because of the ambiguity of the term. It’s not an official term; it means whatever people intend it to mean.

Well, as I emphasized just above in this reply, the term “Roman Catholic” is not an official one and means whatever the one using it intends it to.

I personally - and this is just my opinion - feel it doesn’t make sense to say that all Latin Catholics are “called Roman … because we are from Rome.” I personally am not from Rome at all. As far as I know, I don’t have a smidgen of Italian ancestry at all. So I don’t feel Roman in any sense.

Of course, as a Catholic Christian, my particular church- i.e. my diocese, governed by my local bishop - is in communion with the Church of Rome, but I do not think that makes me Roman.

Of course, my diocese does obviously use the Roman Rite, so I guess in that sense most Latins could be called Roman.

I see what you mean. When I said from Rome, I meant the Western Church Sui Juris. I have links from the Vatican website that explain that all western Rite Catholics are Roman, seperate from the Eastern Rites. If you are interested, I will be more than happy to share them.

God Bless,
BVMFatima

 

[Vico]

http://forums.catholic-questions.org/picture.php?albumid=601&pictureid=9279

http://forums.catholic-questions.org/picture.php?albumid=601&pictureid=11498