Why Eastern Catholicism

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Josie_in_the_East

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Hi all. I am currently converting into Catholicism but I wondered if I could get a few responses explaining why people here are Eastern Catholic vs Eastern Orthodox?

I understand that for many it will be because of their belief in the primacy of the Pope. However I wondered if there were any other reasons that convinced people one way or the other?

Or if anyone here had personal experience of how orthodoxy compares?

Would also love to hear from anyone with experience the other way (that went from being Catholic to Orthodox) and their reasons for doing so.

Thank you.
 
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Josie_in_the_East said:
I understand that for many it will be because of their belief in the primacy of the Pope. However I wondered if there were any other reasons that convinced people one way or the other?
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The largest switch from Eastern Orthodoxy to Eastern Catholicism occurred at the Union of Brest, where many EO’s came on over. Here’s the text, right from the principals in the matter.
https://web.archive.org/web/20110623153014/http://www.ewtn.com/library/COUNCILS/TREATBR.HTM
 
I think why many people are Eastern Catholic rather than Eastern Orthodox would 1- There family or culture has a history, say if your family came from western Ukraine or from parts of Poland or Hungary, 2- The individual appreciates the reverence of the Divine Liturgy and there is typically less evidence of progressivism within the local church than the Latin but they don’t feel they can make the big leap 3- All of the above and they also feel an allegiance that the Catholic Church is the true church and more universal possibly than the EO. I think it is a difficult decision for most people to break entirely with the Catholic Church, particularly cradle Catholics…
 
The need of the Churches for Discipline. The bickering and disorder (such as the constant excommunications over stupid things that the Catholic Church sorted out a long time ago) in Orthodoxy outside of Communion with Rome… the fact that the Catholic Church presents the greatest and most perfect conceptualizations and ideas of what the union of all Christians would and could look like…

The Western Rite in Orthodoxy outside of Communion with Rome is no Church… and many Eastern Christians, and even sadly to say many Eastern Bishops outside of union with Rome are very totally opposed to reunion with Rome apart from ‘conversion’ of all Latins to the Eastern Rite.

Also, the Bosnian Genocide, encouraged by the self-headed Serbian Orthodox Church, at the hands of their people… the way that their Bishops and people have not been called to account by the Church or asked to repent… all the while Antioch has excommunicated Jerusalem for ordaining Priests in its canonical territory (a far less crime than carrying out and promoting (and not discouraging) Genocide)… It’s all proof that great evil is possible without a highest court of appeals and leader, as is the case with the Catholic Church.

I have friends that are Bosnian and fled for their lives while their family members were butchered and buried in mass graves at the hands of Serbians by the encouragement of their leaders in the Self-Headed Serbian Orthodox Church (which was not excommunicated over the matter and has yet to be called to account for genocide… this was in the 90s)

…

Jesus said when there are problems to take it to the Church… and He promised to guide the Church. But where there is total independence (instead of interdependence and order of law and leadership) and individual self-headed Churches lack accountability… what then? What if different Bishops decide differently? That’s why the early Canons establish an order by which order and Church discipline and appeals may be carried out in the Church… through the Pentarchy… with the See of Rome through the guarantees of Christ to Peter being the highest ‘court’ of appeals among all the Churches of God on earth.
 
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NotMyOwn said:
I have friends that are Bosnian and fled for their lives while their family members were butchered and buried in mass graves at the hands of Serbians by the encouragement of their leaders in the Self-Headed Serbian Orthodox Church
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However, in WWII, didn’t the reverse happen in Croatia with Serbian Orthodox being the victims at the hands of the Ustase who had the backing of some of the Catholic clergy?
 
Eastern Catholics truly are children of a lesser god, as in they are deprived of all their efforts in ending the great Schism. They are basically rooted in Orthodox people who decided, without any Synodal approval in Orthodoxy, to mention the Pope of Rome as first bishop or even just as a bishop. Because some claim their reason were based on circumstances rather than true faith, like getting favors from the Catholic emperors of certain times, many Orhodox despise them. But why they did it only God knows. Why Pope Francis 2gether with Patriarch Kyrill said that uniatism (Eastern Catholicism) is obsolete now as a conclusion of Schism is beyond my understanding. I am not Uniate, I am Orthodox, but I empathise with them when I just don’t see why are they being judged or left behind simply based on hear say and what some think their motivations may have been. Sabe Deus.
I think they shouldn’t be taken for granted by Rome or Constantinopole, I just feel for them, they are being left behind when in truth I do believe they were faster than others in solving… these…theological issues. In here I am an agnostic in my own Church and to Rome after the Havana meeting - why not hug the ones who have been faster than you have been for the fast 500+ years when you two couldn’t solve things at Ferrara-Florenza? So unfair.
 
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Before jumping into the Tiber, you should wade over into the Bosphorus and figure this out for yourself. Go, taste and see

 
Some of this seems really inaccurate, I highly doubt Pope Francis said anything about Eastern Catholicism being obsolete, given that he was in charge of Ukrainian Greek Catholics in his home country. Unless you can give me a source, in the original language, from a Vatican website, I’m not going to buy it.
 
adamhovey1988 said:
I highly doubt Pope Francis said anything about Eastern Catholicism being obsolete
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“25. It is our hope that our meeting may also contribute to reconciliation wherever tensions exist between Greek Catholics and Orthodox. It is today clear that the past method of “uniatism,” understood as the union of one community to the other, separating it from its Church, is not the way to re-establish unity.”
 
This is an interesting question, but the number of different answers is probably equal to the number of Eastern Catholics. For most cradles, it is a simple matter of the community that you belong to. Those that move away from their home parish may have trouble finding a new home community, given our small numbers; they may need to make a deliberate choice. For me, even though I worship in an Orthodox church (the closet EC one is a 5hr drive), I do not consider reception into that Church, because it would require breaking communion with the Catholic Church, which I think would be wrong. And I think that it is wrong for this to be required.

At the current stage of relations between the Churches, the Catholic Church welcomes Orthodox Christians to receive the Eucharist in Catholic churches; the EOC’s sadly do not reciprocate. It is not outside the realm of allowed belief to regard Catholics as heretics and the Pope as an arch-heretic. In fact, there are strong currents of virulent anti-Catholicism within the mainstreams of Orthodoxy. A person just confided to me that this current, as he personally encountered it as a catechumen, prevented hm from joining the EOC.

As to ecclesiological models, history, etc., these are not high on my list of concerns (Notably there is not a word on this stuff in the Gospel of the Last Judgement.) There are some people, though, who have the strongest sense of certainty on these matters. Somehow they manage to hold to that sense even though they also certainly know that there are others who are far more learned on these matters who disagree with them. I am cautious around such people. And this is an area that I am very uncomfortable with the, which in some quarters, is brazenly dishonest - at a Soviet level - and self-serving in its take on church history.
 
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Hi Josie! I am a cradle Roman Catholic/Latin Rite, however, I am currently
in the process of transferring rites. One of the reasons I’ve decided to make
the switch is imho the Latin Rite Mass is NOT in my language (it is in BRITISH english)!
The bible speaks about the Holy Spirit descending upon the people and they all heard
it in their OWN language, and British English is NOT my language!

Over many years now I’ve been attending the Maronite Church and am at PEACE, whereas,
after the translation change I was SO INTENSELY ANGRY that I felt as though whether I
went to Mass or NOT didn’t matter as I was either committing a mortal sin by NOT going
to Mass or I would be committing a mortal sin by GOING to Mass with such intense anger.
I also must add that I went to confession in the Latin Rite and the priest gave me absolution
but told me to NEVER enter a Catholic Church again! (and this was since the last translation.)

The parishioners have welcomed me with open arms!
 
Thank you all for sharing your experiences/knowledge/thoughts.

Can I ask if you consider both the Orthodox churches and Catholic Churches valid? Is this a common opinion to hold, that all the Orthodox and Catholic Churches together should make up the one holy Catholic apostolic church and that the schism itself is wrong.

I am curious because this is my current opinion and so my wishing to be baptised Eastern Catholic versus Eastern Orthodox is based on circumstance (no Eastern churches around, only Catholic). I also want to be able to worship in English and not have to join a parish where I am the ethnic ‘sore thumb’ if you see what I mean. Is this wrong?

I know I must also believe in the primacy of the pope, which I do however I heard that EOs also believe that this is true to an extent but that believe that the papacy has been misused over the years…
 
Josie_in_the_East said:
Can I ask if you consider both the Orthodox churches and Catholic Churches valid?
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The Catholic Church holds to this idea - for all Apostolic churches. It is not clear that the Orthodox Church does: it has not made a conciliar statement against it, but allows for opinion against it.
Josie_in_the_East said:
also want to be able to worship in English and not have to join a parish where I am the ethnic ‘sore thumb’ if you see what I mean. Is this wrong?
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Depending on your location, that could work in any Church.
Josie_in_the_East said:
I know I must also believe in the primacy of the pope, which I do however I heard that EOs also believe that this is true to an extent but that believe that the papacy
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There is a discussion over what Primacy means and a specific invitation to Orthodox churches from the Vatican to participate in this discussion. EO worry about papal “supremacy”. But these worries are run contrary to actual history, both of the Papacy and of their own EP.
 
The papacy is the only difference between Eastern Catholic Christians and Eastern Orthodox Catholic Christians.

Eastern Catholics are in full communion with the Pope.

Eastern Orthodox are in an imperfect, partial communion with the Church, but technically in schism from the Holy See.

That is the only difference.

Eastern Catholics self describe as Orthodox Christians.
 
Josie_in_the_East said:
I am curious because this is my current opinion and so my wishing to be baptised Eastern Catholic versus Eastern Orthodox is based on circumstance (no Eastern churches around, only Catholic). I also want to be able to worship in English and not have to join a parish where I am the ethnic ‘sore thumb’ if you see what I mean. Is this wrong?
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Your chances of finding a Ukrainian Catholic parish in the UK which serves in English are not very high it has to be said.
 
dvdjs said:
The Catholic Church holds to this idea - for all Apostolic churches. It is not clear that the Orthodox Church does: it has not made a conciliar statement against it, but allows for opinion against it.
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I see, thank you for explaining. This was confusing me.

Unfortunately, where I live there are no Eastern Catholic or Orthodox churches.

There are orthodox services held monthly at various local churches but they are split up to serve local ethnic groups. So the Russians have a service once monthly in one place and then the Greeks have their monthly service in another church, etc. Their services are in Church Slavonic or Greek or whichever language best serves each community.

I could (maybe?) travel to London once a month where there are English liturgys available in a Ukrainian Catholic Church (only available Monthly) and probably in some Orthodox churches. The rest of the month I would either need to stay home or attend the local Roman Catholic Church (which is what I do now), this is why I’m persuing Eastern Catholicism over Orthodoxy. I wanted to see if others choices were also motivated by their circumstances or if there were other factors that I had yet to consider.
 
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dvdjs said:
In fact, there are strong currents of virulent anti-Catholicism within the mainstreams of Orthodoxy. A person just confided to me that this current, as he personally encountered it as a catechumen, prevented hm from joining the EOC.
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Ditto. Virulent is too mild a word. What sickens me is an Orthodox person I know, a doctor of medical ethics (lol) teaches at a Catholic University. Appalling.
 
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dvdjs said:
I hope you are saying that this persons anti-Catholicism bother you. I haven’t the least concern of Orthodox serving on the faculty at Catholic institutions. The Byzantine Catholic Seminary has some Orthodox faculty and has had others over the years.
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If they are anti-Catholic they should be exposed and pressured to leave. If they are not anti-Catholic they may be a nice fit on the faculty.
 
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