Why are there disputes of territory between each church?

[DictatorCzar]

I’m freakin confused about everything. Antioch has 6 different patriarchies claiming that they rule Antioch. The weird thing is that 3 of the patriarches are Catholic and 2 of them are Orthodox. Why couldn’t there just been 1. Jerusalem and Alexandria has disputed too. Why is there only one church in Rome and Constantinople?

 

[commenter]

Different rites have their own patriarchies. Where I live, in the US, my city is in a Latin Rite diocese, which my parish belongs to. But there are churches very close to me that are Catholic, and are included in other dioceses (cathedral in another city, but includes my city) for Maronite and Ukranian Catholics, and perhaps other Catholic rites. My city also includes Eastern Orthodox congregations, so in effect I live in their diocese, too, even if the cathedral is in another city.

Since most of the people who relate to one of the Antioch based patriarchs don’t live in Antioch, what does it matter if other patriarchs have their home office there?

 

[dochawk]

I believe that the Orthodox are one EC and one EO.

For Catholic, there is an OC now in communion with Rome, the Melkite’s who split from the Oriental Church after the Orient rejected Chacedon and as a separate issue spent centuries out of communion with Rome, and a Maronite who exists because they were separated for centuries and couldn’t elect one with any of the others [my guess is that they would share with either the Melkite or OC]).

I don’t know about a sixth, but the five took a group picture a couple of years ago!

The very existence of the “Latin Patriarchs” of Jerusalem and Alexandria is downright petty and childish . . . they should be left empty or be replaced with some kind of administrator as they become vacant.

hawk

 

[DictatorCzar]

Why are there 3 Catholic patriarchies in Antioch. Doesn’t that make that more counfusing and make more division between each other?

 

[Cor_ad_Cor]

OP, I’m confused as to why you think there’s a dispute and why you think a patriarch “rules” a city? We usually strive to have coexistence in historically significant metropolitan areas, and there’s no concern about who else is there as long as everyone is at peace.

 

[dochawk]

Why are there 3 Catholic patriarchies in Antioch. Doesn’t that make that more counfusing and make more division between each other?

Yes, one would be better, but first the oriental schism with the west split it, and then the maronites were out of contact for centuries, so threws is the natural consequence.

Given the historical abuse of eastern catholics in North America by RC bishops, any church will be hesitant to give up its own head to share one . . .

hawk

 

[twf]

I’m pretty sure the Latin patriarchal sees of the “East” are vacant…other than Jerusalem. And to be fair there is no other Catholic bishop of Jerusalem.

Lisbon, Venice, and Goa are the only other active Latin Patriarchs I’m aware of- and those were never Eastern sees.

 

[dochawk]

I seem to remember something about the vacancies . . . also the non-papal western patriarch don’t have, well, patriarchal authority. They are mostly (entirely?)tales attached to sees.

 

[twf]

Yeah they’re just ordinary Latin metropolitans (or national primates at best) with fancy titles.

In the Oriental Orthodox world, the Armenians do the same thing (lesser patriarchal sees subject to a greater primate). - for example, the Armenian Patriarchs of Constantinople and Jerusalem.

 

[RealisticCatholic]

I found this article extremely helpful a while back:

The Other Successors of Peter: The Patriarchs of Antioch

Gregory III Laham, the Melkite Greek Catholic Patriarch of Antioch, has joked that if the Apostle Peter had just stayed put, he himself would be the earthly head of the Catholic Church today.

www.crisismagazine.com

Thus at that point there were three Patriarchs of Antioch, or four if you count the Latin one: the Miaphysite (rejecting Chalcedon and not in communion with Rome or Constantinople); the Orthodox (accepting Chalcedon and in communion with Constantinople, but not with Rome); and the Maronite (accepting Chalcedon and in communion with Rome, but not Constantinople). Are you confused yet? Just wait, because….

Yet another Patriarch of Antioch appeared between 1662 and 1702, and then on an ongoing basis since 1783: the Syrian Catholic Patriarch. The Syrian Catholics were members of the Monophysite (yes, I mean Miaphysite) Church of Antioch who were returning to communion with Rome. Since the non-Chalcedonian Church of Antioch had not been subject to the Byzantinizing influence that the orthodox Church had undergone, both the Syriac Orthodox and the Syrian Catholics today are singular in preserving the ancient liturgical tradition of the Church of Antioch, and celebrate one of the oldest liturgies of the Church, the Divine Liturgy of St. James.

Thoroughly Byzantine, by contrast, was the Antiochian Orthodox Church in 1724, when its newly enthroned Patriarch, Cyril VI Tanas, declared that he was in communion with Rome. Enraged, a contingent of his priests immediately traveled to Constantinople, where the Patriarch Jeremias III had already gotten wind of Cyril’s intentions and refused to recognize his election. Jeremias chose a new Orthodox Patriarch of Antioch, Sylvester, who opted to rule his See from afar in Constantinople, as did his successors for many decades thereafter.

The party that followed Cyril, meanwhile, came to be known as the Melkite Greek Catholic Church. “Melkite,” or King’s men, was an ancient appellation for adherents of the Council of Chalcedon when the Byzantine Emperor was alone in accepting it and all the Eastern patriarchs rejected it. A venerable title of the Church of Antioch, “Melkite” with the new developments came to be used solely of those who accepted the authority of the Pope of Rome, the monarch of the Church. “Greek,” meanwhile, referred to the rite of the Church, just as does “Roman” in Roman Catholic: the Orthodox Church of Antioch had by this time been Byzantined for nearly a millennium.

 

[RealisticCatholic]

So basically, it’s hard to say which is “original,” as the history involves factions and their separate developments.

For example, as the quote above suggests, you can’t really call the Eastern Orthodox Antioch any more original than the Syrian Orthodox (or, from them, the Syrian Catholic) Antioch — at least not in the same way. For while the EO Antioch represents the continuation of the chalcedonian church (the one united church that accepted Chalcedon — i.e., the Church of both West and East prior to the Great Schism of 1054), it also was later Byzantine-influenced, especially by the time of the split from Rome.

(i.e., hence, it was not too difficult for Byzantine Antioch to take Byzantine Constantinople’s side in the West-East schism).

However, the Syrian Orthodox (part of Oriental Orthodox, not the Eastern Orthodox), though split from the universal communion of East and West in the fifth century, it retained the original Syriac tradition, and so is in its own way the “original” too — compared to the later developed Byzantine style that influenced Byzantine Antioch of Eastern Orthodoxy.

And as for disputes:

Those who remain are united by their shared difficulties. Of course, while there are five Patriarchs, the three Catholic ones are not competitors or rival claimants; each, of course, recognizes the historical right and prerogatives of the other. And in the 1990s, the Antiochian Orthodox and Melkite Greek Catholics built a church, St. Paul’s, that they share in Doumar, a suburb of Damascus. What’s more, the Melkite Patriarch Gregory III has offered to step down in favor of his Antiochian Orthodox counterpart, Ignatius IV Hazim, if the Catholic and Orthodox Churches reunite.

 

[commenter]

I believe Pope Benedict gave up the title Patriarch of the West. Anyone have an idea why? I assume Pope Francis has not resumed it.