Websites Needed

  • Thread starter Thread starter apostolicfaith
  • Start date Start date
Status
Not open for further replies.
A

apostolicfaith

Guest
I live in Iowa and no where near an Eastern Catholic Church.

For whatever reasons my spirituality has been pulling me into more Eastern traditions of prayer than that of the Latin Rite. I have an undergraduate and a graduate degree in catholic theology.

I have purchased a few books but have exausted my small budget. Do you know of any good websites or resources for me to learn more about Eastern Catholicism (theology, spirituality, terminology) and some sources to discover the main differences between the two. I want to immerse myself in the spirituality and one day begin attending Divine Liturgy near my parent’s house when I visit.

So…know any websites?
 
There are several good websites out there, but I’ll just point you to a few. First of all byzcath.org is a great place to start. They have a forum section that is frequented by both Eastern Catholics and Orthodox. As on any forum, the discussions can get somewhat heated, but they are well worth looking into. Also oltv.tv has a lot of great videos by some very prominent Orthodox and Catholic theologians that are be worth looking into. Finally melkite.org has a lot of great sources for Eastern Catholics and what we believe.

In reality, the best way to become immersed in Eastern spirituality and theology is through regular attendance at the various liturgies, particularly the Divine Liturgy. If you have an Eastern Catholic parish near you it would behoove you to check it out. Even if you have an Orthodox parish near you it would still be great to go. On occasion I attend the Greek Orthodox parish a few blocks away from where I live, partially because I love going there, and partially because I have some friends there that I enjoy visiting with whenever possible.

Remember also that Eastern Catholics are much closer, if not identical, theologically and spiritually to their Orthodox Mother Churches than to the Church of Rome. Checking out Orthodox theology written by Orthodox theologians is another great way to learn about Eastern Catholicism. 👍

Above all, simply enjoy the journey. I myself have been on the same journey from West to East for the past few years. I’ve simply been waiting for the approval of my wife to make the official change. She’s finally given the thumbs up 😃

ICXC + NIKA,
Phillip
 
There’s also the Melkite eparch’s site

www.melkite.org

It has links to other sites.

Here’s the site of the Chaldean Catholic Diocese of St. Peter (which covers the western USA)–an entirely different tradition:

www.kaldu.org

It will have a link to their English recension of the Liturgy of Ss Addai and Mari.
 
Glory to Jesus Christ!
apostolicfaith said:
I live in Iowa and no where near an Eastern Catholic Church.

For whatever reasons my spirituality has been pulling me into more Eastern traditions of prayer than that of the Latin Rite. I have an undergraduate and a graduate degree in catholic theology.

I have purchased a few books but have exausted my small budget. Do you know of any good websites or resources for me to learn more about Eastern Catholicism (theology, spirituality, terminology) and some sources to discover the main differences between the two. I want to immerse myself in the spirituality and one day begin attending Divine Liturgy near my parent’s house when I visit.

So…know any websites?
Click to expand...
Welcome!
I’m a fan of the interviews Catherine Alexander did with the monks of Holy Resurrection Romanian Catholic Monastery Click on the “… (more info)” to see all the questions Catherine Alexander asks in each section.

Fr Loya’s weekly radio program Light of the East is an wonderful resource. It’s on Catholic radio Sundays at 8:30am Pacific time. Like the HRM monks Fr Loya is a Byzantine Catholic but he and they are quite familiar with other Eastern and Oriental Catholics.

Eastern Christian Media has a number of good videos up.

You’ve exhausted your book budget. For future reference, I personally love Bread & Water, Wine & Oil: An Orthodox Christian Experience of God. The book is written by an Orthodox priest. The reviewers there on Amazon well describe how readable the book is while covering well the topics.

If there are any Orthodox churches near you, you might consider going there for Vespers, or Festal Vigils etc. During Lent there will be many liturgies outside of the normal Sunday Divine Liturgy. The hymnography is so rich. It could really deepen your Lenten season as a Catholic. Listening to any EC or Orthodox liturgical music is catechesis in its own rite. We had Vespers tonight for Meeting of the Lord. My head is swimming with the hymns.

I second Phillip 's suggestions re: byzcath.org and oltv.tv, not to down play the excellent sites everyone else has also suggested.
 
Christ is in our midst!

Another website you might be interested in checking out is ancientfaith.com. This is the online radio station of the Orthodox Church in America. Most of the programs are very good and informative. Every now and then one needs to take some comments with a grain of salt because some of the speakers tend to misrepresent/over-simplify the Western tradition, but over all the programs are very good and there is a very wide selection ranging from personal anecdotes, to history, to theology and spirituality, and even a new one on learning Byzantine Chant! 😃
 
Diak said:
Where in Iowa are you? We have a Ukrainian Greek Catholic (UGCC) parish in Omaha.
Click to expand...
My parents are in Omaha. Are you from Omaha? Do you have info on this parish? I am there about every month or two.
 
Phillip_Rolfes said:
Christ is in our midst!

Another website you might be interested in checking out is ancientfaith.com. This is the online radio station of the Orthodox Church in America. Most of the programs are very good and informative. Every now and then one needs to take some comments with a grain of salt because some of the speakers tend to misrepresent/over-simplify the Western tradition, but over all the programs are very good and there is a very wide selection ranging from personal anecdotes, to history, to theology and spirituality, and even a new one on learning Byzantine Chant! 😃
Click to expand...
Having made a couple Orthodox references I hesitated to make another 🙂 but I also love
Ancient Faith Radio. 👍 Here is the direct link to the new virtual workshop on Byzantine chant.

If OP has access to EWTN they usually trot out relevant sections at Pascha and the Nativity of the old Light of the East series which is very good. In the Feb specials they list EPARCHY OF OUR LADY OF LEBANON: ANCIENT ROOTS…NEW SOIL: An introduction to the Maronite rite of the Church in America scheduled for 2/24/2010 3:00 AM EST 1 hour. And maybe March will have a Light of the East program related to Great Lent and Pascha. Last year I think they aired the segment re Great Lent close to Pascha. Maybe they thought we were on the Gregorian Calendar 😉 They just ran an excellent program on Iraq’s Christian Refugees in Syria and Jordan. There is not much on the ECs/OCs on EWTN but programs do come up and they can be quite good.
apostolicfaith said:
Originally Posted by Diak View Post
Where in Iowa are you? We have a Ukrainian Greek Catholic (UGCC) parish in Omaha.
Click to expand...
👍
Click to expand...
 
Status
Not open for further replies.
Back
Top