Are there any Eastern Catholics or Orthodox Christians here who have come from the Latin Church or from Protestant traditions and who have had to overcome a sense of not belonging to an ethnicity that was not his own?

I find myself...exploring, I suppose would be the best word...the Eastern Church of late. Testing the waters, you might say. I found myself at first taken by the aspects of Roman Catholicism that I have been uncomfortable with and which seem to be (refreshingly) absent in Eastern Christianity.

Beyond not seeing in the Eastern churches things I would rather not see in my own, I also find myself drawn in and positively attracted to the Eastern liturgy, and to the rather different perspective on various things that Eastern Christians seem to have that I am beginning to notice.

One thing that keeps me at a distance, though, is that it seems to me that Eastern Christian churches are heavily tied up with various ethnicities, in a way that Roman Catholicism is not. While Roman Catholicism seems to me to have a universality about it, Eastern Catholicism and Orthodoxy seem, by contrast, heavily ethnically-oriented (no pun intended). One feels like something of an outsider for that reason. One's name doesn't end in "akis" or "apolous" or "chev" or "evsky" and one feels like a foreigner as a result. It would seem that for a Roman Catholic to switch to an Eastern Catholic milieu, one would almost be "converting", so to speak, to an Eastern or Eastern European ethnicity. It would seem odd, for example, to say, "I'm a Ukrainian Catholic" if one were not Ukrainian, or "I'm Greek Orthodox" if one were, in fact, Irish or French or Mexican. No one, on the other hand, expects Roman Catholics to be from Rome, obviously.

There is something that I find more...authentic, I think...about the Eastern Church. Something more in tune and harmonious with the ancient Church. Heaven help me, much of what I read concerning Orthodoxy makes alot of sense to me whereas so much about Roman Catholicism never quite did. There are things like the "Filioque" issue that I can't possibly worry about because I'll never understand it either way. That would never lure me out of Roman Catholicism. But other things...

At any rate, I say what I have said with all due reverence, guarding due deference to the Magisterium. Those are simply thoughts I confess to have been having lately. But one thing that still seems compelling, to me, about the Roman Catholic Church is the fact that it is not wrapped up in any particular ethnic milieu. It is universal. You can be Irish, you can be American, you can be Japanese, you can be British, French, Portuguese, Hungarian, Indian...and not feel like a fish out of water...because the RC church includes every ethnicity under the Sun.

But Eastern Catholicism or Orthodoxy seem, to me, at any rate, geared toward various ethnic groups and lack that sense of all-inclusiveness. What I would like to hear is feedback of Eastern Catholics or Orthodox who did not belong to any of the ethnic groups that the various Orthodox churches are named after or which they cater to (forgive my terminology), yet who somehow managed to overcome that "impediment", as it were, to feel at home in the Church of the East.

Also, is there a "brand" of "Eastern" Christianity that is not ethnically "Eastern" at all, which, while retaining the liturgical and spiritual heritage of the churches that are considered "Eastern", cultivates that sense of universality that one sees in the RC Church?

It would seem to me that I would feel very much at home in a church that had what Eastern churches have but which was not really "Eastern" at all. I haven't a drop of "Eastern" blood coarsing through my veins, and so to consider myself somehow "Eastern" would be bizarre. But that magnificent liturgical heritage of the Eastern churches does seem to be calling to me.

I was baptized into the Ruthenian Byzantine Catholic Church as an adult, having grown up in a non-observant Jewish-Baptist household; not a drop of Slavic blood in my body--or my wife, or my children (we all got baptized at the same time). We never had any problem fitting in, nor did we ever feel out of place.

Consider these words of Father Robert Taft:



I was not so provincial as to require the faith I adopted to be utterly familiar; with my baptism, I considered myself being adopted into a great extended family with its own history and own customs.

StuartK:

I don't require a new perspective into Catholicism to be familiar. It would hardly be a new perspective in that case. I merely wonder if is it possible to immerse oneself in those things which are characteristic of what we call "Eastern" without being sensible of an ethnic differentiation all the time. You say you feel at home, but is that because the ethnic heritage of the particular church you've joined doesn't impact you, or is it because you've embraced that culture?

Is there any sensible experience of Orthodoxy that is for Westerners coming to Orthodoxy ethnically-neutral, or is one necessarily embracing the ethnic cultural heritage of the particular Orthodox church one joins? And, if so, isn't that rather forced or contrived or unnatural, somehow?

But above I use the term "Orthodoxy" at least, which needn't necessarily say "Eastern". But one couldn't describe Eastern Catholicism except to describe it as "Eastern". Does there exist an experience of those things that compose what is called "Eastern Catholicism", only minus the "Eastern" in terms of ethnicity? If so, and if it is not Orthodox, what would one term all of it, I wonder?

I've got a long drive ahead tonight, so I'll have to answer more fully tomorrow night or Wednesday, but I'll give the short version. Some 47 or so years ago (when it was rare to find former Latins in a Melkite parish unless they had married into it), this reddish-haired Irish kid joined the Cathedral parish and was accepted with open arms.

In the decades since, no one has ever led me to feel as if I was not fully a member of that community.

Many years,

Neil

Shlomo,

Even with all the problems in my parish, one is not accepting of others. We have a hugh Fillipino Community, Latin American, and Indian Community. When you get our newsletter we have sections for each community so that they know they are fully part of our parish.

If you are ever in Vegas I can show you a parish that is Eastern and multi-ethnic.

Fush BaShlomo,
Yuhannon

Right. Okay, well, I suppose I'm not imagining that a congregation of Greek Orthodox would not welcome a new Orthodox who was not a Greek or that a Ukrainian Catholic congregation would shun a Catholic without Ukrainian heritage. That never crossed my mind. I'm more or less wondering if there is to be found an experience of...Byzantine Christianity...that is ethnically-neutral. A church that is neither "Greek" this nor "Russian" that nor "Armenian" the other thing, and so on.

Now after posting this topic it occurs to me that there is in this area a "Byzantine Catholic Church". Would that, perhaps, be a church that would offer such an ethnically-nonspecific experience of the manifestation of Catholic Christianity that we refer to as "Eastern" I wonder?

I ask all of you to bear in mind that I am just discovering the Eastern Rites and so I beg you to pardon my ignorance. I am sincerely trying to learn more, however, and I thank any of you who have the patience to offer me some guidance.

Where do you find a Latin parish that is ethnically neutral? I grew up in New York, and within a short bus ride of my house I could find Italian, Polish, Hispanic, and Irish parishes--with substantial differences in both style and culture among them. Out in Texas, my wife grew up around German and Czech Catholics--again, very different cultures in each. Go to Europe and discover there is no "vanilla" Roman Catholicism--every country celebrates Mass differently, every country has a different Catholic culture.

What Americans think of as "vanilla" (non-ethnic) Roman Catholicism is a variant on Irish Catholicism, the default variety that the (predominantly Irish) Catholic bishops of the 19th century decided to impose upon their flocks in an attempt to promote a uniform "American" Catholic culture. For the most part, it was a colossal failure.

StuartK:

Yeah, well, I'm an Irish-American and that "vanilla" sort of suburban ethnically sanitized form of Catholicism is precisely what I'm used to, I suppose.

Of course there exist RC parishes in areas which are predominantly populated by Catholics of one ethnicity or another, however they seem to be rather few and far between these days(at least in my neck of the woods...I live in Western New York, which is much more like the Midwest than it is like NYC). In my experience, one is not sensible of a dominant ethnicity in the typical RC parish.

But I'm talking about entire Churches, here, not just ethnic parishes in neighborhoods dominated by a certain ethnicity. Apart from those who have "married-in", would one find many Russian Orthodox who are not Russian, or Greek Orthodox who are not Greek, or Ukrainian Catholics who are not Ukrainian, or Maronites who are not Lebanese, &c, &c &c? Or does there, indeed, exist apart from my knowledge a Byzantine Christianity that is not dominated by one ethnicity or another, similar to Roman Catholicism?

RI,

The 'Byzantine Catholic Church' of which you speak would be a Ruthenian parish. The extent to which any particular parish of the Pittsburgh Metropolia is ethnicized or not can vary significantly, as I suspect my Ruthenian brothers and sisters will agree.

Many years,

Neil

You forget that all the churches were once ethnic churches. It's simply by virtue of being the largest and most widespread and most politically dominant that the Roman Catholic church appears to have lost its ethnic flavor. In the United States, in particular, it mirrors the great Melting Pot that is our society.

This will keep you at a distance only to the degree that you decide to let it. My family is classic American -- English Irish German Hungarian Russian Apache -- and we are certainly not kept at a distance by the Lebanese-Syrian-Palestinian roots of our Melkite parish. I don't understand all the Arabic that is used in the liturgy, but I understand the Liturgy. I can't talk to parishioners who speak only Arabic, but I can (and do!) talk to everyone else. I can't make baklava, but I sure do enjoy eating it! You get my drift: If you see the ethnic roots as "other," than you will experience the liturgy as an "other." If you see the Body of Christ in all its wondrous beauty, you will experience yourself as the Body of Christ.

I would say that the Roman Catholic Church in the U.S. is still mainly an aggregation of ethnic parishes, though in some areas amalgamation has resulted in a set of ethnic communities sharing a single parish, yet still maintaining their unique identities by the multiplicity of Masses catering to the needs of each. E.g., in Northern Virginia there are parishes that are predominantly Hispanic but which have substantial Anglo and Vietnamese contingents. There are English Masses, Spanish Masses, and Vietnamese Masses, which, to my mind, amounts to three ethnic parishes under one roof.

In most major cities, you'll find parishes that have Spanish and English Masses, each attended by discreet groups of people, One parish, or two? Elsewhere, you might find a different mix, but the same effect.

And in rural areas, where communities are more stable, the ethnic parish still exists.

Penthaetria:

Thank you for your insights. Let me just make it very clear that for me it isn't a matter of needing to avoid any particular ethnicity or ethnicities that aren't my own. I say that only in the event that some might get that impression from my, perhaps, ineptly-worded posts at times.

In my own Latin Rite tradition I revel in ethnic parishes. Irish-American though I am, I often go to a local Italian-American parish in the city that offers both a Latin Mass and an Italian Mass on Sunday (no English Mass...can you believe it). I like their festivals and feats. It's great. There are a few heavily Polish parishes nearby whose traditions I likewise enjoy.

With respect to my recent foray into the East, I enjoy the Ukrainian church I've been attending recently (even if they do all sit in the back three pews so that a newcomer forced to sit ahead of them and cannot, therefore, follow the congregation and is frequently left standing long after everyone else has sat down ). I recently marvelled at a Coptic Orthodox evening praise service, where I was very warmly welcomed and made to feel very much at home.

So I don't mean to say that I want to avoid ethnic experiences that are foreign to my own or that I would not feel comfortable in a parish that happened to be dominated by some ethnicity or other that was not my own. I don't mean to say that at all, really.

My concern is more with being able to identify, if that makes sense. In any Roman Catholic parish, regardless of the ethnic makeup, I sense that I belong completely because the Roman Catholic Church, itself, is not centered around or based upon any one particular ethnic heritage. I could be at Mass in Tokyo and I would have no sense of being the odd man out; I would simply perceive that I was amongst fellow Roman Catholics.

Now, at the Ukrainian Catholic parish I've been attending, I am certainly sensible of the fact that I am likewise in the presence of my fellow Catholics. But I am also very sensible of the fact that I, unlike everyone else there, do not participate in what the Church...is designated as.

Again, it doesn't vex me, so that I cannot feel comfortable there; I am comfortable. But I am at the same time aware that I am in the parish of a national Church that is specifically for persons of a certain ethnic heritage. That isn't the same as sitting in the pews of a parish that happens to be dominated by a particular ethnicity because of the neighborhood it's in.

Now, if I were to change rites...which I am not going to, but just for the sake of argument let's say I were to...I would never be able to really convince myself that I was a "Ukrainian" Catholic...not being Ukrainian. If I were to become Orthodox (which I am not going to), it would be fine if it stopped at simply "Orthodox". I could call myself "Orthodox" just as I call myself "Catholic". There's nothing ethnically-oriented about the designation "Orthodox". But how could I convincingly call myself "Greek Orthodox" not being Greek, or "Russian Orthodox" not being Russian?

But the designation "Byzantine Catholic" I could identify with (again, I'm not planning to switch rites, but if I were to). That designation makes sense to me as a style or tradition of Catholicism that isn't necessarily tied up with a particular ethnicity (even though it may, in fact, happen to be). But the style "Byzantine Catholic" would, of itself, have no more ethnic connotation than would the style "Roman Catholic". Both words speak, to me, more of history and tradition than they do of any one particular nationality or ethnic heritage.

If Eastern Christianity, then, were just a matter of "Byzantine Catholic" or "Orthodox" I could perceive a universality about the traditions as opposed to a provinciality. In fact I do perceive a universality in the liturgical and spiritual traditions, in the art and architecture, in the music and so forth, in the various component elements in and of themselves. In and of themselves, all of it speaks to me of the universal Church, and not of something specifically national or even necessarily specifically "Eastern" for that matter.

I suppose my question, then, for those "Eastern" Christians who are not of the ethnicity of the ethnically-specific Church within the Eastern Catholic Church or within the Orthodox Church that they belong to (either because they converted, switched rites, or married in), is there a sense in which you find yourselves able to identify with that broader universality without being sensible of an ethnic isolation?

Also, is there, perhaps, any agitation or movement toward removing the various ethnic walls that compartmentalize Eastern Catholicism or Orthodoxy so that the universality inherent in the Christian traditions of the so-called "East" might be more readily underscored and experienced?

Gee, I thought I answered that.

Penthaetria:

Yes, I'm sorry. Thank you for your insights. I understand how your experience within a particular church/Church oriented towards an ethnicity not your own would not impede you in any way from embracing or immersing yourself in the overarching Christian (or even Catholic) identification or experience, or from perceiving yourself as a member of the Body of Christ. I don't mean to question that at all.

I suppose I'm more concerned with discovering how Christians experience the universality, not of the one, holy, catholic, and apostolic Church in general, but more specifically of the traditions that constitute that "side" of the Church which I would (no doubt ineptly) call "Eastern Rite Christianity" when that experience, so characterized as it is by ethnic balkanization, if you will, is not native to them.

I suppose what you may be saying, though, is that you experience that universality precisely by focusing, not on your specific "national" Church, and not even upon the "Eastern" concept, at all, but on the broader universality of the catholic Christian Church (or more generally, still, upon the concept of the "Body of Christ").

Hmmm. I suppose I hadn't considered simply overlooking (or looking beyond, as it were) as a method of identifying. I wonder if I would be capable of such an approach. I mean, I know that I am capable of it on a local level, or in a temporary way such as when I am in a situation in which I am a visitor in a parish that is not of my own cultural heritage. That I understand, of course. I look beyond the "foreign" ethnicity (although I am the foreigner in such a case) that dominates to see the broader Catholicism that I, also, belong to. In that context, your response makes perfect sense to me.

But I can do that because there is no exclusive national affiliation with respect to the broader Roman Catholic Church. The same cannot be said for the various components of "Eastern" Catholicism (or of Orthodoxy). I would desire, I think, to somehow positively perceive a universality of the catholic Christian tradition that I call my own. A sense that I could be that "kind" of a Christian and identify completely as such irrespective of my ethnic background.

That is why I used the example of the designation "Byzantine". It isn't the same as "Ukrainian" or "Russian" or "Greek" or "Armenian" or "Coptic" (&c). Now, I do understand that, in point of actual fact, "Byzantine Catholics" are typically persons of slavic heritage, or what have you. But the word, itself..."Byzantine"...speaks, per se, to no specific ethnicity, only to a history and a tradition, in much the way "Roman" does. It describes a "kind" of catholic Christianity in a nationally-neutral way...in a universal way.

I also used the example of the designation "Orthodox" which has that same quality about it. Since my original post, I have been reading a bit, and it is my understanding from what I have read that the various national Orthodox churches in the USA may be uniting to form one universally "American Orthodox" Church.

That makes sense to me. I can see that appealing to non-Russian and non-Greek and non-Coptic (&c) Americans of any nationality who might want to embrace the experience of Orthodoxy and to identify as "Orthodox", but who wouldn't, at the same time, be able to identify as "Greek" or "Russian" or "Coptic" (&c) because they simply aren't Greek or Russian or Coptic (&c). It would make even more sense to me if they simply decided to become "The Orthodox Church", plainly and simply, without the designation, "American" as a qualifier. Or at least, "The Orthodox Church(in America)".

I mean, if I wanted to convert to Orthodoxy, I could convert to "The Orthodox Church (in America)" without any qualms, because I would be able to identify with a Church known that way. I would be converting to "The Orthodox Church". I would identify, then, as "Orthodox". See?

I wouldn't, on the other hand, so easily be able to become "Russian Orthodox". It would seem as though I were not only converting from Catholicism (in my case) to Orthodoxy, but from Irish to Russian (as if such a conversion were possible). I simply couldn't identify as "Russian". That designation would always seem forced, contrived, inaccurate, false.

I couldn't really even call myself "Eastern". But I could be "Orthodox". I could be "Byzantine".

Does that make sense?

Now, I should make it clear that I'm not looking for help converting to Orthodoxy or desiring to change my Catholic rite or anything. I'm not, and so the whole matter is somewhat academic to me. I'm just trying, as Roman Catholic, to get a greater understanding of how Catholics and Orthodox who do not ethically or culturally identify as being in any way "Eastern" understand themselves within the context of Eastern Rite Catholicism. I'm not trying to "solve" anything, only to hopefully gain some interesting insights from people who have lived this experience.

I'm not quite the template the OP had in mind but I figure I'm close enough to chime in. I am a mix of largely German, Norwegian and Irish heritage and was raised Roman Catholic, but went through the process to change my canonical enrollment to the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church. While my wife is primarily of mixed slavic heritage (1/4 Ukrainian, 1/4 "Slovak" [whom genetic testing seems to imply were at one point Old Believers], 1/4 Polish) she grew up Roman Catholic as well. We fell in love with the Eastern liturgy, spirituality, discipline, and theological perspective, and after a few years went through the process to change churches (primarily to make life simpler for our expanding family).

I guess I feel at home, because don't really think of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church as the Church for Ukrainians, I think of it as the church of Kiev. It isn't church equivalent of an ethnic parish. I don't see myself as pretending to be Ukrainian -- I do see myself as someone who has adopted the praxis and discipline of my particular church. I imagine St. Volodymyr didn't see himself as becoming Greek -- he instead saw himself as becoming a member of the Church of Constantinople.