Topic: Looks like ROCOR will dismantle its WR

[Peter J]

There is a solution to bringing in non Orthodox clergy - make them complete a 3 year program at one of our Orthodox seminaries.  It's that simple. Sure most won't do it, but do we really want all our  convert clergy to get their theological training from the "Orthodox Christian Information Center"?

Basil

More importantly, they should serve/observe for a period or time with a priest.  We had a recent convert pastor (sort of out of the ordinary, as he had served in that capacity at stable Protestant parishes for decades) who was mentored by our priest for years, and then served alongside him for a period of time (at one point, with his congregation, as they were forced out of the building by those who stayed Baptist and their former parishioner allies) before ordination, and then thereafter.

Sorry to focus on a small detail but ... so their preference would have been to share a church building with Baptists?

 

No, the majority of the Baptist parish was going Orthodox.  The stubborn minority then recruited every former Baptist member they could get a hold of to vote in the election on that.  So the building remained Baptist (I don't know if it continued on after its majority of active members left).

By "the stubborn minority" do you mean they were stubborn b/c they didn't want to 'dox, or because they didn't want to let go of the building?

both.

Thanks for clarifying.

I guess I'm stubborn too.

[Nephi]

Though still somewhat vague, it appears ROCOR WR will not yet be going anywhere:

http://rwrv.org/files/decrees/WRCommunityStatus.pdf

And the ROCOR WRV Facebook page:

His Eminence, +Metropolitan Hilarion. has published a decree confirming the continuing stavropegial status of Western Rite communities in the ROCOR.

http://www.rwrv.org/files/decrees/WRCommunityStatus.pdf

I thought, based on what people in this thread said, Christminster was stavropegial but the Vicariate itself was not? Or does this comment mean that the Vicariate will continue as stavropegial from now on?

[mike]

I thought, based on what people in this thread said, Christminster was stavropegial but the Vicariate itself was not? Or does this comment mean that the Vicariate will continue as stavropegial from now on?

Vicariate was stavropigial since Bp Jerome wasn't a dioceasan bishop.

[Nigula Qian Zishi]

I just wished the ROCOR synod would tell their Priests to interact with other Orthodox. We have 8 parishes here, 7 somewhat regularly interact and help with local Orthodox charities and pan-Orthodox events. The ROCOR parish has (voluntarily) isolated itself and no one really even knows or sees the Priest. I've heard it's similar elsewhere too. I don't understand it.

In DFW, the ROCOR parish is part of all the pan-Orthodox events and even holds some. It is only the Serbians that do not participate.

[TheTrisagion]

I just wished the ROCOR synod would tell their Priests to interact with other Orthodox. We have 8 parishes here, 7 somewhat regularly interact and help with local Orthodox charities and pan-Orthodox events. The ROCOR parish has (voluntarily) isolated itself and no one really even knows or sees the Priest. I've heard it's similar elsewhere too. I don't understand it.

In DFW, the ROCOR parish is part of all the pan-Orthodox events and even holds some. It is only the Serbians that do not participate.

Dang Serbians. 

[TheMathematician]

I just wished the ROCOR synod would tell their Priests to interact with other Orthodox. We have 8 parishes here, 7 somewhat regularly interact and help with local Orthodox charities and pan-Orthodox events. The ROCOR parish has (voluntarily) isolated itself and no one really even knows or sees the Priest. I've heard it's similar elsewhere too. I don't understand it.

In DFW, the ROCOR parish is part of all the pan-Orthodox events and even holds some. It is only the Serbians that do not participate.

Dang Serbians. 

The Serbs in Buffalo takes part, as does ROCOR in the pan orthodox vespers during lent

[serb1389]

I just wished the ROCOR synod would tell their Priests to interact with other Orthodox. We have 8 parishes here, 7 somewhat regularly interact and help with local Orthodox charities and pan-Orthodox events. The ROCOR parish has (voluntarily) isolated itself and no one really even knows or sees the Priest. I've heard it's similar elsewhere too. I don't understand it.

In DFW, the ROCOR parish is part of all the pan-Orthodox events and even holds some. It is only the Serbians that do not participate.

Dang Serbians. 

We can't help that we're the best jurisdiction in the US

[The young fogey]

Philly isn't a very Orthodox city, certainly compared to the rest of Pennsylvania, which is OCA and ACROD central. A handful of parishes of all ethnicities/jurisdictions (Greek, the three Russian denominations, Ukrainian, Serbian, Albanian, Romanian, and, outside the city, Arab and a couple of ACROD parishes). The ROCOR parish isn't unfriendly, just very Russian (WWII refugees), only one of two really Russian places, the other being MP. The Serbian parish at least used to be in the city but it may have moved to the 'burbs. I understand it was very isolated from the other Orthodox ones, but then again, with different ethnic groups and different languages, the churches have little in common. The ROCOR place in Tullytown outside the city (never been) is recent and ex-vagante. One convert Antiochian place in the 'burbs (the Arab one's close to the city).

Also, a couple of Armenian and Coptic churches in the metro area.

Also, Ukrainian Catholics (their cathedral and several parishes), Ruthenian Catholics (two parishes, maybe one now), a small Armenian Catholic parish, and a Maronite parish. The Ukes and Ruthenians are fading away as far as I can tell. Armenian Catholic nuns (like conservative but modern Roman Catholic ones) run a private school that many local Armenians, Catholic, Armenian Apostolic, and Congregational, send their children to.

[TheTrisagion]

I just wished the ROCOR synod would tell their Priests to interact with other Orthodox. We have 8 parishes here, 7 somewhat regularly interact and help with local Orthodox charities and pan-Orthodox events. The ROCOR parish has (voluntarily) isolated itself and no one really even knows or sees the Priest. I've heard it's similar elsewhere too. I don't understand it.

In DFW, the ROCOR parish is part of all the pan-Orthodox events and even holds some. It is only the Serbians that do not participate.

Dang Serbians. 

We can't help that we're the best jurisdiction in the US

[kijabeboy03]

The smartest thing for ROCOR to do right now, now that it's clearly in communion with the rest of Orthodoxy (since union with Russia), would be for it to release its former WR parishes to Antioch. Everybody would save face.

Amen.

I am not sure the Antiochian Archdiocese of North America would accept many of the priests. At least 2 of them were turned down for ordination by the Antiochians, and thus why they ended up with ROCOR. Also, there have rules on how big a congregation must be before they are given mission status, let alone parish status.

I didn't think of that. Thanks. So the ROCOR WR Vicariate was largely a paper church of tiny parishes. I was thinking more of the attitude adjustment they'd need, moving from the ROCOR WRV, an anti-Catholic spite church, to the AWRV, traditional Catholicism but without the Pope. My guess is a number of them could do it, in order to keep some form of their culture (just not the form they created/prefer), remain Orthodox, and thus save face. Then again some of the ROCOR WRV rites were so byzantinized I imagine a number of these people will just go Russian Byzantine.

I wonder if ROCOR could have achieved their desired result, without the scandal of ordering WR parishes to go Byzantine, by merely encouraging them to go Byzantine?

The Eastern American Diocese of the ROCOR had a story on exactly this, a RWRV mission that was transferred (and presumably byzantinized):
http://eadiocese.org/News/2013/june/miss.en.htm

[Shanghaiski]

I just wished the ROCOR synod would tell their Priests to interact with other Orthodox. We have 8 parishes here, 7 somewhat regularly interact and help with local Orthodox charities and pan-Orthodox events. The ROCOR parish has (voluntarily) isolated itself and no one really even knows or sees the Priest. I've heard it's similar elsewhere too. I don't understand it.

In DFW, the ROCOR parish is part of all the pan-Orthodox events and even holds some. It is only the Serbians that do not participate.

Dang Serbians. 

We can't help that we're the best jurisdiction in the US

The world, Father, the world. If it hadn't been for St. Milutin putting the fear of God into John V, we'd all be kissing the papal ring and singing kumbaya with cardinals. The Serbs were anti-union with Rome before it was cool.

[Peter J]

I wonder if ROCOR could have achieved their desired result, without the scandal of ordering WR parishes to go Byzantine, by merely encouraging them to go Byzantine?

The Eastern American Diocese of the ROCOR had a story on exactly this, a RWRV mission that was transferred (and presumably byzantinized):
http://eadiocese.org/News/2013/june/miss.en.htm

I think it comes down to what assumptions you make. That is to say, after reading that link I can understand how people could say Okay that all sounds fine; sounds like it was completely voluntary etc ... but if there were an article about the reverse (an EC parish becoming Roman-Rite) I'm sure that Orthodox would scream "Latinization".

[The young fogey]

I wonder if ROCOR could have achieved their desired result, without the scandal of ordering WR parishes to go Byzantine, by merely encouraging them to go Byzantine?

The Eastern American Diocese of the ROCOR had a story on exactly this, a RWRV mission that was transferred (and presumably byzantinized):
http://eadiocese.org/News/2013/june/miss.en.htm

I think it comes down to what assumptions you make. That is to say, after reading that link I can understand how people could say Okay that all sounds fine; sounds like it was completely voluntary etc ... but if there were an article about the reverse (an EC parish becoming Roman-Rite) I'm sure that Orthodox would scream "Latinization".

I agree.

[spyridon]

I wonder if ROCOR could have achieved their desired result, without the scandal of ordering WR parishes to go Byzantine, by merely encouraging them to go Byzantine?

The Eastern American Diocese of the ROCOR had a story on exactly this, a RWRV mission that was transferred (and presumably byzantinized):
http://eadiocese.org/News/2013/june/miss.en.htm

I think it comes down to what assumptions you make. That is to say, after reading that link I can understand how people could say Okay that all sounds fine; sounds like it was completely voluntary etc ... but if there were an article about the reverse (an EC parish becoming Roman-Rite) I'm sure that Orthodox would scream "Latinization".

I agree.

+1

[Elisha]

Philly isn't a very Orthodox city, certainly compared to the rest of Pennsylvania, which is OCA and ACROD central. A handful of parishes of all ethnicities/jurisdictions (Greek, the three Russian denominations, Ukrainian, Serbian, Albanian, Romanian, and, outside the city, Arab and a couple of ACROD parishes). The ROCOR parish isn't unfriendly, just very Russian (WWII refugees), only one of two really Russian places, the other being MP. The Serbian parish at least used to be in the city but it may have moved to the 'burbs. I understand it was very isolated from the other Orthodox ones, but then again, with different ethnic groups and different languages, the churches have little in common. The ROCOR place in Tullytown outside the city (never been) is recent and ex-vagante. One convert Antiochian place in the 'burbs (the Arab one's close to the city).

Also, a couple of Armenian and Coptic churches in the metro area.

Also, Ukrainian Catholics (their cathedral and several parishes), Ruthenian Catholics (two parishes, maybe one now), a small Armenian Catholic parish, and a Maronite parish. The Ukes and Ruthenians are fading away as far as I can tell. Armenian Catholic nuns (like conservative but modern Roman Catholic ones) run a private school that many local Armenians, Catholic, Armenian Apostolic, and Congregational, send their children to.

(not directing this at you specifically)

ISTM that the degree an Orthodox parish (mostly focused on those parishes that are mostly "ethnic", which would likely be most) is willing to be "pan" has much to do with how well the parishoners themselves integrate into American society by way of speaking English and non-Orthodox people they socialize/work with.  Ok, did thus just sound too stupidly obvious now?

[Mor Ephrem]

I think it comes down to what assumptions you make. That is to say, after reading that link I can understand how people could say Okay that all sounds fine; sounds like it was completely voluntary etc ... but if there were an article about the reverse (an EC parish becoming Roman-Rite) I'm sure that Orthodox would scream "Latinization".

I agree that it's about the assumptions you make, because honestly I don't see Orthodox screaming "Latinization" if an Eastern Catholic parish voluntarily became a Roman rite parish.  I could see that if they retained the Byzantine rite but suddenly started using hosts instead of prosphora or ditched chant for "hymns" from OCP something like that, but if they switched rites entirely?  At least there's a sort of consistency there (presuming, again, that they're celebrating it by the book and without "Byzantinizations").  It's not unimaginable for Orthodox to find something to argue about, obviously, but honestly, if they even cared to have an opinion about it, I'd think they'd see it differently.  I think they'd see it as having finally picked a side--Catholic or Orthodox--rather than trying to straddle the fence. 

But I could be wrong: has it ever happened before and I missed the backlash?       

[The young fogey]

I think it comes down to what assumptions you make. That is to say, after reading that link I can understand how people could say Okay that all sounds fine; sounds like it was completely voluntary etc ... but if there were an article about the reverse (an EC parish becoming Roman-Rite) I'm sure that Orthodox would scream "Latinization".

I agree that it's about the assumptions you make, because honestly I don't see Orthodox screaming "Latinization" if an Eastern Catholic parish voluntarily became a Roman rite parish.  I could see that if they retained the Byzantine rite but suddenly started using hosts instead of prosphora or ditched chant for "hymns" from OCP something like that, but if they switched rites entirely?  At least there's a sort of consistency there (presuming, again, that they're celebrating it by the book and without "Byzantinizations").  It's not unimaginable for Orthodox to find something to argue about, obviously, but honestly, if they even cared to have an opinion about it, I'd think they'd see it differently.  I think they'd see it as having finally picked a side--Catholic or Orthodox--rather than trying to straddle the fence. 

But I could be wrong: has it ever happened before and I missed the backlash?

As far as I know it's never happened.

[Nephi]

I agree that it's about the assumptions you make, because honestly I don't see Orthodox screaming "Latinization" if an Eastern Catholic parish voluntarily became a Roman rite parish.  I could see that if they retained the Byzantine rite but suddenly started using hosts instead of prosphora or ditched chant for "hymns" from OCP something like that, but if they switched rites entirely?  At least there's a sort of consistency there (presuming, again, that they're celebrating it by the book and without "Byzantinizations").  It's not unimaginable for Orthodox to find something to argue about, obviously, but honestly, if they even cared to have an opinion about it, I'd think they'd see it differently.  I think they'd see it as having finally picked a side--Catholic or Orthodox--rather than trying to straddle the fence. 

Pretty much how I feel, except I'd include the Maronites as well to make it less of a "Catholic vs Orthodox" issue. If a Maronite parish voluntarily became Roman Rite that's fine, but this half-and-half stuff that seems to be rampant in most of their parishes is unfortunate to say the least.

[The young fogey]

Philly isn't a very Orthodox city, certainly compared to the rest of Pennsylvania, which is OCA and ACROD central. A handful of parishes of all ethnicities/jurisdictions (Greek, the three Russian denominations, Ukrainian, Serbian, Albanian, Romanian, and, outside the city, Arab and a couple of ACROD parishes). The ROCOR parish isn't unfriendly, just very Russian (WWII refugees), only one of two really Russian places, the other being MP. The Serbian parish at least used to be in the city but it may have moved to the 'burbs. I understand it was very isolated from the other Orthodox ones, but then again, with different ethnic groups and different languages, the churches have little in common. The ROCOR place in Tullytown outside the city (never been) is recent and ex-vagante. One convert Antiochian place in the 'burbs (the Arab one's close to the city).

Also, a couple of Armenian and Coptic churches in the metro area.

Also, Ukrainian Catholics (their cathedral and several parishes), Ruthenian Catholics (two parishes, maybe one now), a small Armenian Catholic parish, and a Maronite parish. The Ukes and Ruthenians are fading away as far as I can tell. Armenian Catholic nuns (like conservative but modern Roman Catholic ones) run a private school that many local Armenians, Catholic, Armenian Apostolic, and Congregational, send their children to.

(not directing this at you specifically)

ISTM that the degree an Orthodox parish (mostly focused on those parishes that are mostly "ethnic", which would likely be most) is willing to be "pan" has much to do with how well the parishioners themselves integrate into American society by way of speaking English and non-Orthodox people they socialize/work with.  Ok, did thus just sound too stupidly obvious now?

There's the rub. The younger generations leave when that happens, when they Americanize, no longer speaking the old language (happens naturally by the third generation in America for almost everyone) and marrying outside the ethnicity. Parishes of third, etc. generation ethnics, Americans, could be 'pan' while retaining their ethnic flavor but it seems most such Orthodox don't practice Orthodoxy anymore.

Ditto American Eastern Catholics only more of them become Roman Catholic.

[Peter J]

I think it comes down to what assumptions you make. That is to say, after reading that link I can understand how people could say Okay that all sounds fine; sounds like it was completely voluntary etc ... but if there were an article about the reverse (an EC parish becoming Roman-Rite) I'm sure that Orthodox would scream "Latinization".

I agree that it's about the assumptions you make, because honestly I don't see Orthodox screaming "Latinization" if an Eastern Catholic parish voluntarily became a Roman rite parish.  I could see that if they retained the Byzantine rite but suddenly started using hosts instead of prosphora or ditched chant for "hymns" from OCP something like that, but if they switched rites entirely?  At least there's a sort of consistency there (presuming, again, that they're celebrating it by the book and without "Byzantinizations").  It's not unimaginable for Orthodox to find something to argue about, obviously, but honestly, if they even cared to have an opinion about it, I'd think they'd see it differently.  I think they'd see it as having finally picked a side--Catholic or Orthodox--rather than trying to straddle the fence. 

But I could be wrong: has it ever happened before and I missed the backlash?       

So, you're saying that the change kijabeboy03 mentioned is only acceptable because it's a complete switch?

[ialmisry]

Philly isn't a very Orthodox city, certainly compared to the rest of Pennsylvania, which is OCA and ACROD central. A handful of parishes of all ethnicities/jurisdictions (Greek, the three Russian denominations, Ukrainian, Serbian, Albanian, Romanian, and, outside the city, Arab and a couple of ACROD parishes). The ROCOR parish isn't unfriendly, just very Russian (WWII refugees), only one of two really Russian places, the other being MP. The Serbian parish at least used to be in the city but it may have moved to the 'burbs. I understand it was very isolated from the other Orthodox ones, but then again, with different ethnic groups and different languages, the churches have little in common. The ROCOR place in Tullytown outside the city (never been) is recent and ex-vagante. One convert Antiochian place in the 'burbs (the Arab one's close to the city).

Also, a couple of Armenian and Coptic churches in the metro area.

Also, Ukrainian Catholics (their cathedral and several parishes), Ruthenian Catholics (two parishes, maybe one now), a small Armenian Catholic parish, and a Maronite parish. The Ukes and Ruthenians are fading away as far as I can tell. Armenian Catholic nuns (like conservative but modern Roman Catholic ones) run a private school that many local Armenians, Catholic, Armenian Apostolic, and Congregational, send their children to.

(not directing this at you specifically)

ISTM that the degree an Orthodox parish (mostly focused on those parishes that are mostly "ethnic", which would likely be most) is willing to be "pan" has much to do with how well the parishioners themselves integrate into American society by way of speaking English and non-Orthodox people they socialize/work with.  Ok, did thus just sound too stupidly obvious now?

There's the rub. The younger generations leave when that happens, when they Americanize, no longer speaking the old language (happens naturally by the third generation in America for almost everyone) and marrying outside the ethnicity. Parishes of third, etc. generation ethnics, Americans, could be 'pan' while retaining their ethnic flavor but it seems most such Orthodox don't practice Orthodoxy anymore.

Ditto American Eastern Catholics only more of them become Roman Catholic.

My old parish, SS. Peter and Paul, fits  that description-I know fourth generation, and they are still around.
I also know those who left in the second generation, and came back in the third for the funeral of the first, and then brought the second back in.

[The young fogey]

Some, not many, third, etc. generation people are still around.

Minority rites in practice don't do well on either side but they're possible. In practice most Eastern Catholics are self-latinized, basically Roman Riters with an altered version of their original rites, but in theory they're supposed to be liturgically and in theological expression just like their original churches while being wholly Catholic in doctrine, showing the Orthodox that it's possible. Of course the Orthodox don't agree. Likewise, in reverse, Western Rite Orthodoxy. There's the AWRV's traditional Catholicism but without the Pope. Again some spontaneous adoption of the dominant rite's trappings (icons everywhere, 'khouria' or 'matushka'); some of that going back to when they were Episcopalians. The consciously un-Catholic ROCOR WR is different, often heavily byzantinized, or a kind of non-Anglo-Catholic high Anglicanism. ROCOR exists to preserve 19th-century Russian culture; I don't think they're a good fit for a Western Rite.

[Mor Ephrem]

So, you're saying that the change kijabeboy03 mentioned is only acceptable because it's a complete switch?

When I read the article he linked to, it wasn't clear to me that it was a Western rite parish going Byzantine rite; nothing in the article suggested that to me, I thought it was a parish going from one jurisdiction (RWVR) to another (EA Diocese).  Only checking the parish website confirmed it for me.  

Personally, it doesn't matter to me so much if they decide to change rites as long as they do so comprehensively.  I don't know their history to know how solidly "in the West" they were, will they make the switch in an organic, healthy way, etc., but assuming the best from people, if they want it (as opposed to it being imposed from without) and can do it well (preserving the integrity of the rite's liturgy, spirituality, etc.), I don't see an issue other than the loss of one parish of a fledgling WR movement to the already dominant BR.  I'm not invested in "Orthodoxy" becoming a multi-ritual Church--it already is, and I'm already there.  What I care more about is that people don't take a rite and start tinkering with it in the name of making it work better for them without a solid understanding of the rite as it has been handed down.  That happens all the time, in Orthodoxy and in Catholicism, and I hate it.

So yes, if they're going to switch, let them switch completely.  If they want to go from WR to BR, let them adopt the full Byzantine rite as received by their mother Church, ROCOR.  Let them accept what is handed down to them, not take it and screw around with it until they like it.  Liturgy is supposed to transform us, not just or not simply the other way around.  And the same goes for Eastern Catholics.  If they want to be Eastern, they should be Eastern--not majority Eastern with some Latin flavour.  Whether that Latin flavour is self-imposed or Vatican-imposed, we know why it's there.  Insofar as theology is intimately linked with liturgy, I can see why some would argue that Eastern = Orthodox, Western = Catholic, and anything less doesn't work; whether or not one agrees with them, certainly at the basic level of the rites one can appreciate that an Eastern Catholic Church with Latinizations appears to be boutique religion.  And the Catholics are not the only ones guilty of "boutique religion".  

Just my opinion.                

[The young fogey]

...certainly at the basic level of the rites one can appreciate that an Eastern Catholic Church with Latinizations appears to be boutique religion.  And the Catholics are not the only ones guilty of "boutique religion".

I don't think we mean the same thing by boutique religion. Witness old-school, 1930s Greek Catholicism among Slavs, whence ACROD came. Somebody from one of the founding ACROD families explained: church was part of po-nashomu ('our way'); over the centuries it accumulated lots of Western Catholic things (monsignors, First Communion, bination, etc.) but didn't see itself as strongly Catholic. There was no shopping for a religion in an eastern Slovakian village; you had the Greek Catholic parish or you stayed home. The opposite of a boutique religion, a natural one, for those people, at that time. (Which is why ACROD kept those things for many years: they didn't miss the Catholic Church; they just wanted to remain po-nashomu, to be left alone and for things to stay the same, the whole reason they switched. They had a point: the split never should have happened, wasn't about theology, and was our own churchmen's fault.)

Boutique religions: Westerners such as Americans turning anti-Western, adopting a fundamentalist version of Eastern Orthodoxy of course different from cradles' approach (they're cut off from their roots, utterly foreign to cradles), or, the ROCOR WR way, inventing rites and claiming they're pre-schism (no roots in the culture, no living tradition, tiny boutique following, like a hobby church).

[Mor Ephrem]

I don't think we mean the same thing by boutique religion. Witness old-school, 1930s Greek Catholicism among Slavs, whence ACROD came. Somebody from one of the founding ACROD families explained: church was part of po-nashomu ('our way'); over the centuries it accumulated lots of Western Catholic things (monsignors, First Communion, bination, etc.) but didn't see itself as strongly Catholic. There was no shopping for a religion in an eastern Slovakian village; you had the Greek Catholic parish or you stayed home. The opposite of a boutique religion, a natural one, for those people, at that time. (Which is why ACROD kept those things for many years: they didn't miss the Catholic Church; they just wanted to remain po-nashomu, to be left alone and for things to stay the same, the whole reason they switched. They had a point: the split never should have happened, wasn't about theology, and was our own churchmen's fault.)

Perhaps we do have different definitions of boutique religion.  I simply mean subjectively picking and choosing. 

I'm not an expert in "old-school, 1930s Greek Catholicism among Slavs", so I can't speak to that situation.  As you describe it, it seems like an organic development, albeit in certain arguably wrong directions (e.g., "bination").  If an organic development, it may not have the negative connotation I associate with boutique religion, but it is still a fact that a number of those things compromised the rite (if not in its liturgics, then in its underlying theology and spirituality).  If post-Vatican II Eastern Catholics still heartily maintain those things, in spite of the Vatican wanting them to "return to their roots", then I think boutique religion applies--nothing is stopping them from such a return.  But if it's more a matter of their "insecurity" in doing so, that's a different matter entirely.  Of course, they could always just tell the Vatican and the Orthodox to buzz off and let them live the tradition they received their way, "warts" and all, but is anyone doing that?  It seems that their identity is always posited in relation to the Church of Rome or to the Orthodox.       

Boutique religions: Westerners such as Americans turning anti-Western, adopting a fundamentalist version of Eastern Orthodoxy of course different from cradles' approach (they're cut off from their roots, utterly foreign to cradles), or, the ROCOR WR way, inventing rites and claiming they're pre-schism (no roots in the culture, no living tradition, tiny boutique following, like a hobby church).

May I take this opportunity, with respect, to tell you that I always smile when I read your posts: your views are, IMO, "peculiar". 

"Inventing rites and claiming they're pre-schism", if that is in fact what the WR of ROCOR was doing, would fit my own ideas of boutique religion--on that we would agree.  But American converts turning into fundamentalists is not boutique religion to me.  Those people embrace a theoretical construct of what Orthodoxy is or ought to be based on what they've studied, with no connection to the living community or without proper "mentoring", and think they are doing it right and everyone else is doing it wrong.  That's Protestantism: the rejection/lack of connection to the living community of believers, the Church, in favour of some intellectual idea.  Such people have switched affiliations, but haven't converted: I think those people are crazy or misled.  But they're usually "ritually pure".     

[Alpo]

Those people embrace a theoretical construct of what Orthodoxy is or ought to be based on what they've studied, with no connection to the living community or without proper "mentoring", and think they are doing it right and everyone else is doing it wrong.    

That's more or less what converts are usually encouraged to do. Go to the church, don't watch porn, observe the fasts and the like that normal folks doesn't normally do.

[Mor Ephrem]

LOL, where do you go to church? 

[Alpo]

LOL, where do you go to church? 

[Mor Ephrem]

And the normal folk parishioners there watch porn and don't fast?  Nothing new under the sun, I guess. 

[Sleeper]

or, the ROCOR WR way, inventing rites and claiming they're pre-schism (no roots in the culture, no living tradition, tiny boutique following, like a hobby church).

If have often been amused that the proponents of this approach often self-apply the term "traditionalist" when they are the exact opposite.

[Peter J]

I don't think we mean the same thing by boutique religion. Witness old-school, 1930s Greek Catholicism among Slavs, whence ACROD came. Somebody from one of the founding ACROD families explained: church was part of po-nashomu ('our way'); over the centuries it accumulated lots of Western Catholic things (monsignors, First Communion, bination, etc.) but didn't see itself as strongly Catholic. There was no shopping for a religion in an eastern Slovakian village; you had the Greek Catholic parish or you stayed home. The opposite of a boutique religion, a natural one, for those people, at that time. (Which is why ACROD kept those things for many years: they didn't miss the Catholic Church; they just wanted to remain po-nashomu, to be left alone and for things to stay the same, the whole reason they switched. They had a point: the split never should have happened, wasn't about theology, and was our own churchmen's fault.)

Perhaps we do have different definitions of boutique religion.  I simply mean subjectively picking and choosing. 

I'm not an expert in "old-school, 1930s Greek Catholicism among Slavs", so I can't speak to that situation.  As you describe it, it seems like an organic development, albeit in certain arguably wrong directions (e.g., "bination").  If an organic development, it may not have the negative connotation I associate with boutique religion, but it is still a fact that a number of those things compromised the rite (if not in its liturgics, then in its underlying theology and spirituality).  If post-Vatican II Eastern Catholics still heartily maintain those things, in spite of the Vatican wanting them to "return to their roots", then I think boutique religion applies--nothing is stopping them from such a return. 

Well, I'd say the Vatican has for many years been telling both Eastern Catholics (Byzantine and otherwise) and Western Catholics to be true to their roots ... but in some circles, only the message to ECs seems to be noticed.

[Mor Ephrem]

Well, I'd say the Vatican has for many years been telling both Eastern Catholics (Byzantine and otherwise) and Western Catholics to be true to their roots ... but in some circles, only the message to ECs seems to be noticed.

Presuming you're right, I'd argue that's because only the EC's get the message of "returning" and becoming more "authentic".  Where are Western Catholics being encouraged to do the same?  Since Vatican II, "reform" has been all the rage, and any calls to "return" or be more "authentic" are relative to how far down the road "reform" has gone.  At this point, you have to work on stopping the insanity before you can work on being "authentic".  It's not the same. 

[Peter J]

Well, I'd say the Vatican has for many years been telling both Eastern Catholics (Byzantine and otherwise) and Western Catholics to be true to their roots ... but in some circles, only the message to ECs seems to be noticed.

Presuming you're right, I'd argue that's because only the EC's get the message of "returning" and becoming more "authentic".  Where are Western Catholics being encouraged to do the same? 

Remember Pope Benedict XVI? 

[ialmisry]

...certainly at the basic level of the rites one can appreciate that an Eastern Catholic Church with Latinizations appears to be boutique religion.  And the Catholics are not the only ones guilty of "boutique religion".

I don't think we mean the same thing by boutique religion. Witness old-school, 1930s Greek Catholicism among Slavs, whence ACROD came. Somebody from one of the founding ACROD families explained: church was part of po-nashomu ('our way'); over the centuries it accumulated lots of Western Catholic things (monsignors, First Communion, bination, etc.) but didn't see itself as strongly Catholic. There was no shopping for a religion in an eastern Slovakian village; you had the Greek Catholic parish or you stayed home. The opposite of a boutique religion, a natural one, for those people, at that time. (Which is why ACROD kept those things for many years: they didn't miss the Catholic Church; they just wanted to remain po-nashomu, to be left alone and for things to stay the same, the whole reason they switched. They had a point: the split never should have happened, wasn't about theology, and was our own churchmen's fault.)

Boutique religions: Westerners such as Americans turning anti-Western, adopting a fundamentalist version of Eastern Orthodoxy of course different from cradles' approach (they're cut off from their roots, utterly foreign to cradles), or, the ROCOR WR way, inventing rites and claiming they're pre-schism (no roots in the culture, no living tradition, tiny boutique following, like a hobby church).

bination?

And by 1930, they had another option: going back to Orthodoxy.  The father of my old priest was told to do just that by his bishop in AH, getting his papers to leave for the new world: "here we have to be katolik, there you do not have to be katolik."

[Mor Ephrem]

Well, I'd say the Vatican has for many years been telling both Eastern Catholics (Byzantine and otherwise) and Western Catholics to be true to their roots ... but in some circles, only the message to ECs seems to be noticed.

Presuming you're right, I'd argue that's because only the EC's get the message of "returning" and becoming more "authentic".  Where are Western Catholics being encouraged to do the same? 

Remember Pope Benedict XVI? 

Sure, I remember him.  But do the Roman Catholics remember him?  That's what really matters.   

[Mor Ephrem]

bination?

One priest celebrating two Liturgies in one day. 

[podkarpatska]

I wonder if ROCOR could have achieved their desired result, without the scandal of ordering WR parishes to go Byzantine, by merely encouraging them to go Byzantine?

The Eastern American Diocese of the ROCOR had a story on exactly this, a RWRV mission that was transferred (and presumably byzantinized):
http://eadiocese.org/News/2013/june/miss.en.htm

I think it comes down to what assumptions you make. That is to say, after reading that link I can understand how people could say Okay that all sounds fine; sounds like it was completely voluntary etc ... but if there were an article about the reverse (an EC parish becoming Roman-Rite) I'm sure that Orthodox would scream "Latinization".

I agree.

+1

+2

[Deacon Lance]

And by 1930, they had another option: going back to Orthodoxy.  The father of my old priest was told to do just that by his bishop in AH, getting his papers to leave for the new world: "here we have to be katolik, there you do not have to be katolik."

Which is why they all became Orthodox immediately upon getting to America.  Oh wait, none of them did.  It took Latin chauvinism and harassment and several years for that to happen.

[ialmisry]

And by 1930, they had another option: going back to Orthodoxy.  The father of my old priest was told to do just that by his bishop in AH, getting his papers to leave for the new world: "here we have to be katolik, there you do not have to be katolik."

Which is why they all became Orthodox immediately upon getting to America.  Oh wait, none of them did.  It took Latin chauvinism and harassment and several years for that to happen.

A number of them came to America Orthodox: they had been coming home back home in Galicia and Carpathia at least since 1882.  The Metropolitan of Bukowina supplied priests both in the New World and in Galicia (where it was somewhat illegal, but perfectly canonical).  By the outbreak of WWI, the Metropolitanate of Czernowitz was becoming the other half of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, where one of its own was set to succeed the Metropolitan, when WWI and the fall of the Habsburgs resulted in Bucovina being reunited to Romania, and the Ukrainians/Ruthenians were integrated into the Romanian patriarchate-until Stalin and Khrushchev united them to UKraine, reuniting Ukraine and the Ukrainian Church.

In the case at bar, despite the bishops advice, the priest did not take it immediately upon getting to America.  It did take the Latin bishop refusing him because he was married to run home.  But it didn't take him several years to do it.  In fact, it took only a year for our father among the saints Alexis Toth and his parishioners to blaze the trail home in the New World.

[ialmisry]

I wonder if ROCOR could have achieved their desired result, without the scandal of ordering WR parishes to go Byzantine, by merely encouraging them to go Byzantine?

The Eastern American Diocese of the ROCOR had a story on exactly this, a RWRV mission that was transferred (and presumably byzantinized):
http://eadiocese.org/News/2013/june/miss.en.htm

I think it comes down to what assumptions you make. That is to say, after reading that link I can understand how people could say Okay that all sounds fine; sounds like it was completely voluntary etc ... but if there were an article about the reverse (an EC parish becoming Roman-Rite) I'm sure that Orthodox would scream "Latinization".

I agree.

+1

+2

+3
I agree

suck it up

[Deacon Lance]

And by 1930, they had another option: going back to Orthodoxy.  The father of my old priest was told to do just that by his bishop in AH, getting his papers to leave for the new world: "here we have to be katolik, there you do not have to be katolik."

Which is why they all became Orthodox immediately upon getting to America.  Oh wait, none of them did.  It took Latin chauvinism and harassment and several years for that to happen.

A number of them came to America Orthodox: they had been coming home back home in Galicia and Carpathia at least since 1882.  The Metropolitan of Bukowina supplied priests both in the New World and in Galicia (where it was somewhat illegal, but perfectly canonical).  By the outbreak of WWI, the Metropolitanate of Czernowitz was becoming the other half of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, where one of its own was set to succeed the Metropolitan, when WWI and the fall of the Habsburgs resulted in Bucovina being reunited to Romania, and the Ukrainians/Ruthenians were integrated into the Romanian patriarchate-until Stalin and Khrushchev united them to UKraine, reuniting Ukraine and the Ukrainian Church.

In the case at bar, despite the bishops advice, the priest did not take it immediately upon getting to America.  It did take the Latin bishop refusing him because he was married to run home.  But it didn't take him several years to do it.  In fact, it took only a year for our father among the saints Alexis Toth and his parishioners to blaze the trail home in the New World.

Changing your story I see.  First they were told to change when they got to America, now they changed before they came.  The story of Greek Catholics coming to America to become Orthodox is a myth.  They only converted after being treated badly by the Latins.

[Peter J]

The story of Greek Catholics coming to America to become Orthodox is a myth.  They only converted after being treated badly by the Latins.

If it's even that ... Greek Catholics coming to America to become Orthodox seems too absurd an idea to even be called a myth.

[LBK]

The story of Greek Catholics coming to America to become Orthodox is a myth.  They only converted after being treated badly by the Latins.

If it's even that ... Greek Catholics coming to America to become Orthodox seems too absurd an idea to even be called a myth.

Don't be too smug. History shows many a religious group choosing (or being forced) to leave their homeland for elsewhere in the name of religious freedom. The Huguenots are just one well-known example, emigrating to an assortment of countries. A less well-known group are the Prussian Lutherans of the 1830s-1840s, who settled in southern Australia.

[Peter J]

The story of Greek Catholics coming to America to become Orthodox is a myth.  They only converted after being treated badly by the Latins.

If it's even that ... Greek Catholics coming to America to become Orthodox seems too absurd an idea to even be called a myth.

Don't be too smug. History shows many a religious group choosing (or being forced) to leave their homeland for elsewhere in the name of religious freedom. The Huguenots are just one well-known example, emigrating to an assortment of countries. A less well-known group are the Prussian Lutherans of the 1830s-1840s, who settled in southern Australia.

In that sense, I agree.

[podkarpatska]

And by 1930, they had another option: going back to Orthodoxy.  The father of my old priest was told to do just that by his bishop in AH, getting his papers to leave for the new world: "here we have to be katolik, there you do not have to be katolik."

Which is why they all became Orthodox immediately upon getting to America.  Oh wait, none of them did.  It took Latin chauvinism and harassment and several years for that to happen.

A number of them came to America Orthodox: they had been coming home back home in Galicia and Carpathia at least since 1882.  The Metropolitan of Bukowina supplied priests both in the New World and in Galicia (where it was somewhat illegal, but perfectly canonical).  By the outbreak of WWI, the Metropolitanate of Czernowitz was becoming the other half of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, where one of its own was set to succeed the Metropolitan, when WWI and the fall of the Habsburgs resulted in Bucovina being reunited to Romania, and the Ukrainians/Ruthenians were integrated into the Romanian patriarchate-until Stalin and Khrushchev united them to UKraine, reuniting Ukraine and the Ukrainian Church.

In the case at bar, despite the bishops advice, the priest did not take it immediately upon getting to America.  It did take the Latin bishop refusing him because he was married to run home.  But it didn't take him several years to do it.  In fact, it took only a year for our father among the saints Alexis Toth and his parishioners to blaze the trail home in the New World.

Changing your story I see.  First they were told to change when they got to America, now they changed before they came.  The story of Greek Catholics coming to America to become Orthodox is a myth.  They only converted after being treated badly by the Latins.

I knew Bishop Chornock, Father Peter Molchany, Fr. John Dolhy and others who became Orthodox and others, like Fr. Al Matscov (sic) who stayed GC and dozens of immigrants in both camps....the Deacon is correct. The other version of coming to America be become Orthodox is ex post facto rationalization or just plain fiction.

It was the arrogant stupidity of the mostly Irish American hierarchy who couldn't stand the dirty folks from East Europe and their "bizarre"customs and their craven enablers in Rome within the Curia who probably knew better in their hearts, but valued counting (both souls and money) above honesty. It was ironic as for two generations before the Slavs arrived "No Irish need Apply"  was common across the North American continent.