As Cyril Korolevsky pointed out in his timely and prophetic polemic “Uniatism”, the Pope of Rome has pretty much consistently condemned any formal attempt at Latinization throughout the history of all the Byzantine Churches in communion with Rome. The primary fault for Latinization lay on the shoulders of the “uniates” (here meant in the derogatory sense), who, among other things, believe that Catholicism and “Roman” are synonymous. The perspective is that the Byzantine or other Eastern/Oriental ritual traditions are maintained as a concession to those who simply cannot let go of them and become “real Catholics”. Again, this is NOT a position that has ever been endorsed by Rome itself, but is the opinion of the more “Latin”-minded of the Eastern Catholics.
Rome itself has always encouraged the Eastern/Oriental Churches to maintain the fulness of their own particular ritual, theological, disciplinary, etc. traditions.
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Awright. I will have to disagree. The
primary fault for latinizations cannot be laid at the doors of the heads of Eastern Catholic Churches in communion with Rome. One need only look at the significant misunderstandings the Roman Catholic Church in North America had on first encountering Ukrainian/Ruthenian Catholics at the turn of the 19th Century when they emigrated to North America from the old country. “Married Priests: What is this?”, seemed a quite common reaction among the Roman Catholic clergy. There was discrimination, which explains why, for instance, roughly half the Ukrainian Orthodox population out west in Canada can be traced back to originally Ukrainian Catholic families from the old country who had difficulties convincing RCs in Canada of their traditions and rite.
Did this simply occur in the past and is it done with? No; 20 years ago there was a major disagreement in my eparchy of Toronto when the Vatican became involved in the appointment of a new Bishop for our eparchy. The previous bishop had ordained married men, which was and is his position’s prerogative. He was also a strong supporter of the Ukrainian Catholic Church’s right (it is the largest Eastern Catholic Church in the world in numbers) to a Patriarchate. At one point, after Ukraine became independent, some of these candidates for the priesthood, I believe, had to travel to the territory of the old country to be ordained for certain, I am quite sure, though I was young at the time. This had nothing to do with the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, and everything to do with what seemed required by Rome and “latinizations” if one wishes to call misunderstanding the tradition of allowing the ordination of married men a “latinization”.
Metropolitan Sheptytsky of blessed memory in the 1930s and 1940s attempted to cut the “latinizations” out. This legacy was to be continued after Cardinal Josyp Slipyj was released from the Soviet Gulag to the West in the 1960s. Suddenly, for instance in North America, traditional iconostases started going up in Ukrainian Catholic Churches, and communion rails out. Standing, not kneeling, etc.
The Ukrainian Catholic Church was a church of the catacombs during Soviet oppression. During this time, Cardinal Slipyj had proclaimed a Patriarchate (independent governing structure) for the Ukrainian Catholic Church. Such status was never de jure recognized by the Pope, as many of the prelates in the Vatican’s Secretary of State practiced Ostpolitik with Soviet Moscow at the time. The thinking was always once Ukraine becomes free, the Ukrainian Church will be granted its own Patriarchate (as many less numerous Eastern Catholic churches have) as the lack of ecclessial territory always seemed an excuse. Well Ukraine has been independent since 1991. Is there a Patriarchate for our Church? No. Is it entitled to one by right, especially given how many martyrs the Ukrainian Catholic Church gave in the 20th Century. Absolutely.
When the Iron Curtain fell, what befuddled many Ukrainian Catholics even more was that dioceses were created for Roman Catholicism throughout Ukraine, without even taking into account that the Ukrainian Catholic Church was to create eparchies there, since there certainly were faithful there.
Brest? The Ukrainian Catholic Catechism I believe will come out next year. I believe some issues of theology - purgatory, original sin - might be emphasized differently and more in line with Brest than they are in the Catechism of the Roman Catholic Church but, and both our Cardinal and Rome have said, this is to be encouraged as different emphases on theological points are not mutually exclusive but may indeed be complementary.
Awright, just my thoughts. I haven’t posted here for some months until yesterday.
I may go back to hibernating.
