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rben20
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Curious as to why people choose to be Eastern Catholic and not Orthodox Christians? What are your reasons and justifications? Thanks for (name removed by moderator)ut.
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ConstantineTG
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Communion with Rome and the proper place of the Pope in the Church. I think that is the most compelling reason.
Second for most would be because they were born into an Eastern Catholic family rather than an Orthodox one.
Second for most would be because they were born into an Eastern Catholic family rather than an Orthodox one.
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Wesley7
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Truth be told, I had problems with RCIA
After that, I was able to convert to the Orthodox faith without any problems.
That’s why.
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beaumains
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J.M.J.
Well, I am a Roman Catholic myself, but I have some close ties people of the Eastern Catholic Churches, and find them very interesting.
It’s important not to think of the Eastern Churches as a cop out or a not-quite-Catholic Catholic Church for people who are on the fence about whether they want to be Catholic or not. The Roman Rite, it’s true, is the largest, but it is not the only Rite in the Catholic Church. It never has been. The Eastern Churches go back just as far as the Roman Church does, and if we lost their traditions, history, liturgy, ways of thinking, it would be like chopping a leg off the Body of Christ.
All these Churches recognize the Holy Father, so they are just as Catholic as us Romans are, but they preserve an essential part of the Catholic identity by remaining with their own Rites. In a sense, they are what the Orthodox Churches should have been. Hopefully someday soon we will see an exodus coming from those Orthodox Churches into the Catholic Church, and mayhaps these Eastern Churches will become a home for many of them.
God bless,
Well, I am a Roman Catholic myself, but I have some close ties people of the Eastern Catholic Churches, and find them very interesting.
It’s important not to think of the Eastern Churches as a cop out or a not-quite-Catholic Catholic Church for people who are on the fence about whether they want to be Catholic or not. The Roman Rite, it’s true, is the largest, but it is not the only Rite in the Catholic Church. It never has been. The Eastern Churches go back just as far as the Roman Church does, and if we lost their traditions, history, liturgy, ways of thinking, it would be like chopping a leg off the Body of Christ.
All these Churches recognize the Holy Father, so they are just as Catholic as us Romans are, but they preserve an essential part of the Catholic identity by remaining with their own Rites. In a sense, they are what the Orthodox Churches should have been. Hopefully someday soon we will see an exodus coming from those Orthodox Churches into the Catholic Church, and mayhaps these Eastern Churches will become a home for many of them.
God bless,
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Antonius_Lupus
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AMEN!!!
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LoyalViews
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This is the best post I’ve seen in a long time!
But to answer the OP, I think that Eastern Catholics choose to be so, because they want to be in full communion with the Successor of St Peter, and they want to be under his jurisdiction as Christ intended! The Eastern churches are very essential and important rites. Their traditions are natural and organic, just as ours are. And, the liturgies are simply sublime
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Ignatius
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Communion with the See of Peter.
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gurneyhalleck1
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Personally I would be either a Latin Catholic or an Eastern Orthodox Christian, no in-betweens despite my respect for Eastern Catholics. I don’t see Orthodoxy as compatible with Catholicism. As I have visited a lovely Serbian Orthodox parish about an hour north of my town, I see a vast divide liturgically betweeen the Orthodox and Catholicism. But beyond that, theologically speaking there is too much distance and conflict.
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ConstantineTG
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Diversity doesn’t mean we’re not compatible.
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5Loaves
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I have to strongly disagree.
The Orthodox are what they “should be”. The image of Orthodox Churches coming into the Catholic Church is unthinkable. Union if and when that comes would have to be like the Church before West and East divided. If there ever comes a day when there is unity again then we Eastern Catholics will disappear having returned to our mother Orthodox Churches. At present they are quite often a home for us. On any given feast day I think Eastern Catholics, and canonically Latin Church Catholics are quite often found worshiping in Orthodox Churches because we lack access to our own Eastern Catholic Churches, or they have become Latinized shadows of their true selves.
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gurneyhalleck1
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Diversity is fine but I just think there are fundamentals in each that are not harmonious, that’s all. And as the excessive diversity built up even early on, long before 1054 came, the East and the Latins were really “tolerating” each other more than complimenting one another’s diversity. The filioque excommunication from Humbert was just the straw that broke the proverbial camel’s back. It wasn’t the cause. The language barrier, different uses of bread, approach to the atonement and spirituality, versions of liturgy, which Fathers they found appealing/valuable, even original sin and other things, there were just too many things that they had to tolerate.
I think the spirituality of the two, it’s just too distant. The liturgical sensibilities, wow, attending the Divine Liturgy, and I’ve only visited it twice now mind you, is so so so different from the Novus Ordo, it’s light years apart.
I think the spirituality of the two, it’s just too distant. The liturgical sensibilities, wow, attending the Divine Liturgy, and I’ve only visited it twice now mind you, is so so so different from the Novus Ordo, it’s light years apart.
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dzheremi
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This, minus the “Eastern” part. I am personally connected with the Oriental view, particularly the mystical approach to the scriptures and the faith as embraced in the Alexandrian Orthodox tradition. I know there are a few Catholic churches that also come out of that tradition, but I am not interested in moving outside of it or beyond it as those churches must do in order to sustain their communion with Rome.
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ConstantineTG
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True but still it doesn’t mean that we cannot be in communion with one another. Being in communion is different from trying to mix. We don’t have to mix, we can keep our diversity. I guess a good example is Canada vs. the US. In the US, immigrants become American. They have some semblance of their ethnic background but ultimately they all bear American culture. In Canada, the immigrants are encouraged to keep their cultural identity. This would resemble more what the Catholic faith is. Different traditions, different cultures, all living harmoniously with one another in the same faith.
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dzheremi
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I’m really trying hard to not sound rude, but…how does it not mean that? If two communions embrace radically different understandings of many basics of the faith (as is the case here), how can they share communion?
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ConstantineTG
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Because the faith is ultimately the same. Did Christ establish more than one Church? Did Christ teach more than one faith? Is there more than one Jesus?
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dzheremi
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I don’t think anything in the post that you are responding to mentions what Jesus Christ did or did not do. Rather, our divisions are a result of what WE, His followers, have done or not done. Of course there is one Savior, and one church, and one faith. We all agree on that, but disagree on the identity and content of at least the last two. Simply stating that the faith is “ultimately the same” does nothing to address the viewpoints of the other communions which do not believe that the faith is ultimately the same.
I agree with Scott, we are ultimately too different.
I agree with Scott, we are ultimately too different.
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gurneyhalleck1
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Interesting analogy but I think it’s lacking. The United States encourages immigrants to assimilate to our rules and expectations of common law-abiding, patriotic, and cooperative society and yet go anywhere and people are speaking Spanish, Tagalog, Farsi, Chinese, and a gaggle of other languages. In any town there are mosques, Buddhist temples, Chinese cultural centers, and multicultural emphases in college and even in elementary schools up the yin-yang. We are a multicultural society and not the vision you’re painting anyway. My wife is filipino. All my Mexican friends speak Spanish, go to church services in Spanish, freely practice their cultural heritage, etc. There is no culture police. Canada is more progressive than the U.S. with regards to bilingual education, etc. no doubt! But the Quebec French East vs. English West stuff has often gotten out of hand and we could start a whole thread about that…which I would rather not actually
But I think it’s an apples and oranges analogy. Orthodox views Christ differently in some ways, how to worship Him differently, and much about what it means to be a Christian and how polity should function is vastly different. I often note that I hear this melting pot vision coming from Roman Catholics and Eastern Catholic but I don’t believe I’ve ever heard it from an Orthodox Christian at all…I think that’s telling. One is saying how similar the other one is while the other one is saying “speak for yourself.” Not a promising beginning to this diversity really.
But I think it’s an apples and oranges analogy. Orthodox views Christ differently in some ways, how to worship Him differently, and much about what it means to be a Christian and how polity should function is vastly different. I often note that I hear this melting pot vision coming from Roman Catholics and Eastern Catholic but I don’t believe I’ve ever heard it from an Orthodox Christian at all…I think that’s telling. One is saying how similar the other one is while the other one is saying “speak for yourself.” Not a promising beginning to this diversity really.
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Addai
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- Magisterium.
In Eastern Orthodoxy you can’t do this, because I’ve tried. I tried correcting a Greek Orthodox person that was saying a teaching that I knew was against Greek Orthodoxy. I quoted a paper from his “Church” the Greek Orthodox Church of America to refute him. I however was rebuffed that it wasn’t his Church you see he was Canadian and in the Greek Orthodox Church of Canada. (What the other bishop said was not binding even though he was a recognized bishop of his Tradition). The only way I could correct him was to narc and tell his direct bishop… which I didn’t want to do (I wanted to correct him not excommunicate or humilate him).
- Catholicism is more truely catholic in its repesentation world wide. It has a Ecclesiology of the Body besides a Eucharistic ecclesiology. and I would add even with full blown Latinization has been better to Oriental Churches that united with it then the EO that pretty much forced them to give up their unique liturgical heritage.
- Promoting Intellectual growth, theology etc. A number of great saints were intellectuals; being philosophers, or other kind of academics. Since the Great Schism, and with conflict with Latin Scholastics, this form of spirituality has been played down by the EO (to the point where some writers seem anti-intelectual) and their has been a disappearance of the Justin Martyr style saint among them as well.
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Addai
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Purely a practical issue… But it matters a lot to me since I work graveyard shift and work on weekends.
But if you work a job or work schedule that is non standard, you will always be able to find a church service you can attend as a Catholic. You are free to dip into those Latin rite masses if you have to… But unless you live in a very desolate area, you should be ableto find a service to fit every kind of schedule.
With Orthodoxy you are much more limited. You can do sometimes do ok if your lucky and your church has a few different services at diffferent times. But many times your having to work around the schedule, miss church, or maybe look for another job or position that better fits your church’s schedule.
And of course much the same might be true for commuting to church. Depending on where you live vs. where the Orthodox churches are.
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beaumains
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J.M.J.I have to strongly disagree.
The Orthodox are what they “should be”. The image of Orthodox Churches coming into the Catholic Church is unthinkable. Union if and when that comes would have to be like the Church before West and East divided. If there ever comes a day when there is unity again then we Eastern Catholics will disappear having returned to our mother Orthodox Churches. At present they are quite often a home for us. On any given feast day I think Eastern Catholics, and canonically Latin Church Catholics are quite often found worshiping in Orthodox Churches because we lack access to our own Eastern Catholic Churches, or they have become Latinized shadows of their true selves.
Well, if Eastern Catholics are visiting Orthodox parishes on any given day, I hope that it is with the permission of their priest or bishop. Otherwise that wouldn’t be so good.
Too, I strongly believe that reunion to some extent is possible in our lifetimes. Did you hear when John Paul II was in Romania, and the crowds were chanting, “Union Now”? And the new Russian Orthodox Patriarch, a younger man, seems much more open-minded to communion. Younger generations in general, I have noticed, seem much less interested in angry polemics than older ones were. And then, did you notice just recently, when the Pope received a new Tiara, it was the gift of both Catholics and Orthodox. And with all of the dialogging that has been going on lately, there is a greater understanding that the theological issues that have been supposed to divide us in the past are not such an obstacle now. For a good understanding of those, I would read one of James Likoudis’ books. He’s excellent. You’re right, though. There’s still a long way to come. The best thing we can do is pray and commend the cause to the Mother of God, Theotokos.
And no, I don’t think that the Orthodox Churches, all due respect, are what they should be, and I stand by what I said before. In fact I think they have suffered a number of maladies because they broke with Rome. For one thing, there is the truncated doctrinal development - they haven’t been able to adapt and develop their doctrine, and this has gotten them into trouble. Those Churches in communion with Rome have been able to develop the doctrine without altering it, so as to better respond to the new challenges of each age. Too, Orthodox Churches haven’t been able to hold an Ecumenical Council even once, though they hold that that is the only way to pronounce new doctrine. The reason for that, I believe, is that the Churches are in disagreement on many issues, and if they were to come together, there would be too serious a disagreement to come to a consensus. Without a visible leader (someone somewhat like the Pope) to pronounce a Council valid, there’s no real reason to adhere to it. Lastly, and I mentioned this somewhat already, there is disunity between the Churches. Church A is in communion with Churches B and C, but Church D is in communion with A and C, but not B, and so on. It’s very confusing, and it makes the head spin.
These, among other things, are things the Orthodox Churches suffer from. And to relate it back to the thread’s topic, think that it is what many people look to avoid when they join an Eastern Catholic Church, which have all the beauty of the Eastern Orthodox Churches, but without the problems mentioned above.
God bless,
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