As it happened, if my friend went to Melkites in our place he would have had to put up with the priest in the nave facing people and “conducting” responses instead of praying on the altar facing East, while deacon sings litanies; seeing the Melkite version of girl altar servers he would have had a women priests nightmare; and shaking hands as a “sign of peace” would have reminded him of disco masses. But this is by the way.

The point of the two-friends’ example, and one could list many, is that the Eastern Rite Catholics are contemptuously looked down both by Western non-Catholics who contemplate a conversion, and by an ordinary Western-rite Catholic, many bishops including; as well as hated by the Orthodox. For the former they are a halfway house, for the latter they are traitors, and for an ordinary “Latin” they are a non-entity.

Why don’t you assert yourself, by being both pristine and yours? You have much to offer that is your own. Why shouldn’t you bring us to temptation of imitating you, instead of imitating us to prove - both to us, unsuccessfully; and to the Orthodox, to their horror - that you are Catholics? Vatican II encourages you – it doesn’t matter what I say - it is your Ecumenical Council. It expects from you to be a bridge to reunion, not an obstacle.

And you can win: by showing to the Latins that the Catholic Church is more than the Latin Church; and to the Orthodox that you are not after making their pious people “join the club”.

Let your friend go to the Melkites. If he wants more pristine Byzantium, he will find it there. In the mean time, he is free to attend the Tridentine Mass - now the right of every Latin rite priest to celebrate.

I also met one Pole: to him the Ukrainians (he meant Eastern Catholics) are neither Orthodox not Catholics. While in this case there might be an element of Ukrainian-Polish antagonism, his view is that of an ordinary Latin Catholic who with a kind of suspicion looks down at these hybrids who naively believe that they will get more by latinizing themselves, or more accurately, by allowing themselves to be latinized, than by reviving and making use of their precious Eastern heritage.

Please tell me that you have the ability to see what passes the “smell test” when it comes to nationalistic sentiment and bias versus liturgical sensibilities of a Pole vis. the Ukies. Again expedience! If they were full-bearded, über-vostochniki, I seriously doubt the amount of love lost would be any different. More to the point, it isn’t his church, it isn’t his problem.

By all means be – I am addressing the latinizers – be Ukrainians, not Russians, but do not be Latins because you will turn out to be – nothing, hated by the Orthodox and looked down with contempt by the Latins.

IT would not really matter.

To start with…

I don’t mean to be snarky, but this Greek Catholic ex-seminarian and one-time catechumen to Orthodoxy who actively supports his church sort of wants to file this in the “Thanks-but-who-asked-you-anyway?” file. I am not wanting to sound mean or rude… but our church ends up being afflicted by know-it-alls on both sides who seem to have all the answers for what we should be to fit into their worldview of our “proper place and aescethics”. Come worship with us for a few years. Get to know our people, lean our chants, spend a few years meditating on our one-year lectionary cycle, learn to chang parochial vespers. Than we can talk.

My childhood memories of my Hungarian Greek Catholic parish was that of a community that entered in silence, kissed the icons on the tetrapod, and then - all 100 of us- belted out the DL with such gusto and bravado - sunday in, and sunday out - that you would have thought it was the final performance of a long-running show. On any given Sunday - for some - it might have been. That is the piety that captured my imagination. That and the stories of our brave martyr priests and bishops - some of whom died in Nazi concentration camps, some of whom died in gulags.

I did not sit there worried about the fact that some of them quietly prayed the rosary before DL, some of them gave away holy cards, a lot of them were active with their friends in Roman Catholic charities and prayer groups. We didn’t worry about the wrongness of our having pews, or how our DL was abbreviated for our rescension like ALL Byzantine Chrisitans (O or C) is. (Our abbreviations were different, but save for a few 10-member old calendarist congregations, few of us are spending 3+ hours in church every sunday!)

It may not be pristine, but it is “ours.” Even if we did it perfect in your mind, the mind of the Patriarchs of Moscow or Constantinople (the latter of whom has under his wing a flock of ex-Greek Catholics who to this day are Latinized)… Well we don’t do it for any of you.

Again, not trying to be mean or snarky, and not even praising the so-called Latinizations… but my dander goes up when “outsiders” tell us “how to do”. What is it to them? We can’t please everyone - get too “Greeked-up” the Latins get scared, and the Orthodox still just think we are uniates… but more dangerous still because when we “look just like them” we get accused of duplicity and trying to unknowingly convert unsuspecting pious laity.

We can’t win.

I quit trying.

This reminds me of the big jocks picking on the new “nerds” that transferred to the school this year.

Maybe, instead of calling names and looking down at other people, we Christians should start picking people out of the gutters and nursing them back to health. Maybe then we’d be so busy we’d stop with this un-Christian behavior and we’d be One Flock with One Shepherd again.

If Greek Catholics want pictures of the Sacred Heart or statues of St. Therese or Padre Pio LET THEM HAVE THEM!!! Would you begrudge an Eastern Catholic for having a statue or photograph of John Paul II?

Should I, a Latin Catholic, burn my Pantokrator, my St. Luke, and my Crucifixion Icons? Should I unravel my chotki?

Take some advice from somebody who has plenty to give…
Feed the hungry, give drink to the thirsty, clothe the naked, shelter the homeless, visit the imprisoned, visit the sick, bury the dead, admonish the sinner, instruct the ignorant, counsel the doubtful, comfort the sorrowful, bear wrongs patiently, forgive all injuries, pray for the living and the dead.

That ought to keep you busy for the next 1000 years. After you have done this to every single person who needs these Works of Mercy, then you can start picking at the devotions that bring them closer to God. :-x

I also met one Pole: to him the Ukrainians (he meant Eastern Catholics) are neither Orthodox not Catholics. While in this case there might be an element of Ukrainian-Polish antagonism, his view is that of an ordinary Latin Catholic who with a kind of suspicion looks down at these hybrids who naively believe that they will get more by latinizing themselves, or more accurately, by allowing themselves to be latinized, than by reviving and making use of their precious Eastern heritage.

By all means be – I am addressing the latinizers – be Ukrainians, not Russians, but do not be Latins because you will turn out to be – nothing, hated by the Orthodox and looked down with contempt by the Latins.

To start with, demonstrate your Catholicism by accepting and applying what the Vatican II, which is your Council as well as Latin, expects of you. Show your Orthodox brethren, whether Russian or Ukrainian, how one can remain Orthodox and yet be Catholic. After all, by restoring union with the Holy See your ancestors did not intend to abandon their orthodoxy, but only accept a doctrinal unfolding of the common heritage that took place in the West while the East was groaning under Islam. You have a beautiful Liturgy to which our Latin liturgy, even Tridentine (not to mention the post-Vatican II fabrication) is no match. It is your gift to the Church without which she would be mutilated. If you wish to enrich it draw from your own resources, do not make Latin parrots of yourself.

It is an expedience plain and simple. Those intent on reviling Rome… Well it reminds me of a variation of an old tasteless joke:

Q: What do you call the most über-vostochnik Orthodox in Communion with Rome?

A: Uniate dog.

Let’s not forget - in our haste - to remember that some of the Latinizations were a logical result of communion. If you are a Greek Catholic, and part of the Catholic Church, and in communinon with church that canonized St. Margaret Mary Alaqocue… Well in simple piety, just as some Latins dig iconns and the Jesus prayer, some Greek Catholics are going to be all about the Sacred Heart. Further some aspects of the Latinizations serve as signs of nationalistic contradistinction vis. the Ukies and Russians?

To wit: “We are clean shaven, not like those wild-beareded Russians!”

“We have the devotions of new saints and apparitions from out church, not like those Russians!”
If I had a reason to believe that the removal of certain externals alone were the real and genuine reason for roadblock, I would go on a road-trip with a sledge hammer knocking down every station of the cross, statue of the Little Flower, and Sacred Heart painting I fould within a 1 mile radius of even the smallest UGCC chapel.

The problem is, I just don’t buy it.

Furthermore, they are far from responding loyally to the Vatican II decree OE 5,6,22; UR 14-18, particularly 17/2, and the recent (1998, I think) Instruction of the Congregation for Easter Churches.

No wonder that the Eastern Rite Catholics are contemptuously referred to as “Uniates” by their Orthodox counterparts, and that they constitute an obstacle to reunion. The Orthodox rightly fear that the same is in stock for them should they “return.”

I am not going into the allegations against the lawfully appointed bishops of the Ukrainian Church as persons. My own view is that the allegations of this kind, if made in public, are immoral, whether true or not, and wonder how the four bishops could be our teachers of faith. I would suggest that the morality and orthodoxy are not their main concern, but the retention of latinizing elements of the liturgy and other practices inherited from their ancestors who were brainwashed by external latinizers.

By the way, I am a Latin Rite Catholic.

“The work of the devil will infiltrate even into the Church in such a way
that one will see cardinals opposing cardinals, bishops against bishops.
The priests who venerate me will be scorned and opposed by their confreres…churches and altars sacked; the Church will be full of those who accept compromises and the demon will press many priests and consecrated souls to leave the service of the Lord.

“The demon will be especially implacable against souls consecrated to God.”

We’re living in times of great spiritual confusion, in addtion to great sin, and, whatever the value and outcome of this situation in Pidhirts’i, the following words of Our Lady in Akita are also useful for us who are on the periphery of the proceedings (Akita, Aug. 3, 1973):

“Many men in this world afflict the Lord. I desire souls to console Him, to soften the anger of the Heavenly Father. I wish, with my Son, for souls who will repair,
by their suffering and their poverty, for the sinners and ingrates.”

Whatever goes on with this episcopal situation — and I do agree with many of the points that the foursome raises — I firmly believe that it is our personal prayers and sacrifices (especially don’t forget sacrifices — even your hangnail is of greater value than you realize!) consciously offered for the sake of God bringing great good out of this that will leave an impact. God often wants our token offering, willingly given, in order to bless us with something — and to remind us that we are all interconnected through Him, even if, humanly speaking, our connection with Bishops Markian, Elias, Metodej, and Samuel is only through floating in blogospheric ether!

BTW, for a good short prentation re Our Lady of Akita, see: http://www.ainglkiss.com/bvm/Akita.htm. (Quotes in this comment taken from this site.) The message itself, though short, is quite sobering in its entirety.

For an interesting detailed account of what happened in Akita, see Fr. Teiji Yasuda’s book, “Akita: The Tears and Mesage of Mary.” Father Yasuda was chaplain at the convent where the apparitions and related miracles took place, though after the messages themselves.

CHRIST IS RISEN!