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Originally Posted by Irish_Ruthenian
Originally Posted by StuartK
Perhaps a more trenchant question might be "Where did all the Ruthenians go, and why?"

Easy answer, Stuart.

THEY

DIED!!
...
"Next time you go to a parish, look around and see what you see. Chances are that you will see 90% old babas,

I admit that the Slavic languages are Greek to me, but doesn't "baba" mean grandmother? A place full of grandmothers should be positively teeming with grandchildren, should it not?

The whole thing is a microcosm of Western society as a whole. Immigration is a lovely thing, but if we're not bothered to replace ourselves or pass on our civilisation or religion to another generation of our own, what makes us think anyone would join us and reproduce on our behalf?

Evangelisation should make us grow faster, but only if we're growing all on our own to begin with.

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I'm sure it will be seen as gloating but many folks including me were predicting all this to be coming with churches closing.....and this is not the last of it....I seem to remember a year ago St. Gregory's in the Cleveland area closing as well.....

Yep, you're right. It sounds like gloating. However, there are many more pertinent reasons for the congregation shrinkage.

Third and fourth generation Americans have converted to American consumerism, materialism and planned parenthood, just as the former congregations of nearly every denomination in the USA.

Tell us, of the congregation which you joined (I'm assuming there hasn't been new immigration for 90 years) what is the population compared to 1955?

Last edited by Paul B; 11/30/12 01:26 AM. Reason: grammar
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Bob: It's not Sviatoslav, it's Patriarch Sviatoslav. Lets show some respect.

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Years ago we were one church until issues of ethnicity got out of hand. It is insane that the Ruthenians and Ukrainians are apart when we have so very, very much in common.

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Originally Posted by Pavloosh
Bob: It's not Sviatoslav, it's Patriarch Sviatoslav. Lets show some respect.

Well, I could have said His Beatitude Sviatoslav, though, considering that's really the title, although in the Ukrainian DL, it's Major Archbishop. Whatever it is, I know, never meant disrespect by not titling his name, just putting out a quick post of what could happen to save the Eastern Rite.

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I admit that the Slavic languages are Greek to me, but doesn't "baba" mean grandmother? A place full of grandmothers should be positively teeming with grandchildren, should it not?

Not necessarily. The original Ruthenian plantation in the United States was in New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Ohio, and corresponds roughly to what is called the "Rust Belt". The population of the region has been shrinking not just because of smaller family sizes (a phenomenon, by the way, that dates back to the foundation of the Republic) but also to the dearth of jobs and migration to other places in search of work (kind of like what drove the Rusyn to this country in the first place).

The reason congregations are full of grandmothers and grandfathers but no grandchildren is the children have moved to places where they could find decent jobs and raise their families. The population of Cleveland, for instance, has fallen from 915,000 in 1950 to just 396,000 today; its population dropped by 17% in just the last decade. Every major city in Ohio, with the exception of Columbus, lost population over the last decade. The population of the state as a whole grew by a whopping 1.6%, while the country as a whole grew by 9%.

Now, back in the '50s and '60s, during the industrial and baby boom, a lot of parishes built new churches or enlarged old ones in the belief that existing trends would continue unabated. Those large, inner city churches today have become white elephants. City populations fell, and neighborhood composition changed, but the parishes ignored this and continued business as usual, even as their congregations grayed and shrank. A vigorous outreach during the 70s, 80s, and even the 90s might have retrieved the situation, but most parishes stood pat, and now they will reap the consequences.

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Correction Bob - in the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Divine Liturgy it is Patriarch Sviatoslav! We call it like it is and eventually Rome will get our message.

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Originally Posted by StuartK
Quote
I admit that the Slavic languages are Greek to me, but doesn't "baba" mean grandmother? A place full of grandmothers should be positively teeming with grandchildren, should it not?

Not necessarily. The original Ruthenian plantation in the United States was in New Jersey, Pennsylvania and Ohio, and corresponds roughly to what is called the "Rust Belt". The population of the region has been shrinking not just because of smaller family sizes (a phenomenon, by the way, that dates back to the foundation of the Republic) but also to the dearth of jobs and migration to other places in search of work (kind of like what drove the Rusyn to this country in the first place).

The reason congregations are full of grandmothers and grandfathers but no grandchildren is the children have moved to places where they could find decent jobs and raise their families. The population of Cleveland, for instance, has fallen from 915,000 in 1950 to just 396,000 today; its population dropped by 17% in just the last decade. Every major city in Ohio, with the exception of Columbus, lost population over the last decade. The population of the state as a whole grew by a whopping 1.6%, while the country as a whole grew by 9%.

Now, back in the '50s and '60s, during the industrial and baby boom, a lot of parishes built new churches or enlarged old ones in the belief that existing trends would continue unabated. Those large, inner city churches today have become white elephants. City populations fell, and neighborhood composition changed, but the parishes ignored this and continued business as usual, even as their congregations grayed and shrank. A vigorous outreach during the 70s, 80s, and even the 90s might have retrieved the situation, but most parishes stood pat, and now they will reap the consequences.

Sure, this is not unusual. The city of Hamilton has an area maybe ten city blocks long with probably 15 ethnic (RC, EC, EO) parishes, each built for one wave of immigrants. As the Polish kids grew up, became prosperous, and moved to the suburbs, only some of them stayed with the parish but none of their own children did. So too the Irish, Italian, Ukrainian, Vietnamese, Serbs, or what have you. Parishes go from nothing to nearly nothing in three generations, more or less.

So people move. That's impossible to address. What about that they quit church? And my old RC parish directory is full of Ukrainian names.

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This happens it seems everywhere. A new group comes in, they live for some time in the same clearing house suburbs that each group moves through. They make their money and move out to the suburbs gradually to be replaced by a new group of people and then integrate into the general community. Some end up a long way from the general bulk of the group and are effectively lost as a result. This is the same story here in Australia. The last census results of the UGCC in Austalia are not good at all and for the same reasons. The last census tells we have an Australian part of the Eparchy of 3055 people. Well I know there was a funeral recently so that has gone down by 1. There are Parishes here with more people than that and the UGCC have a diocese for them. gatherings of what is left as churches close is to be expected.

cool

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True, Pavel, although there are some Ukrainian Parishes here in America that are actually GAINING parishioners from the old country. Seems like there are some still coming over. Now if only more Ruthenians would have jumped on board those same planes to this country...

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Originally Posted by Pavloosh
Correction Bob - in the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Divine Liturgy it is Patriarch Sviatoslav! We call it like it is and eventually Rome will get our message.

Well, the Anthology lists it both ways. Although in the DL Book at St. Josaphat, it's really called Major Patriarch... But that wasn't the point I was trying to make. The point was, that he, Metropolitan Archbishop William from the Ruthenian Church, and Pope Benedict should come together, strike a deal that would merge our two congregations, our two clergies, and our two traditions together somehow so the Eastern Slavic Rite has a chance of survival in this country.

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Bob

The Anthology for Worship gives the commemoration of the Patriarch as

Quote
Patriarch ( Major Archbishop)
- meaning that either term can be used

The Sacrifice of Praise from St Josaphat in Parma gives
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Patriarch
though I'll admit that I have only checked the large hardback copy at present but can't check the Congregational one as I have lent my copy out to a member of our Clergy .

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All right, all right... Let's just get back to the topic of this post, and my original point before you guys brought up this little Title point. I was just finding solutions that could save the Eastern Rite from sliding downhill in this country to keep these closures from happening, or from the Byzantine Church going extinct. I suggested the meeting of Patriarch Sviatoslav with Metropolitan William and Pope Benedict to bring the Ruthenian Church and UGCC together. Then I suggested that we try reaching across to the Latin Rite to allow members of certain parishes to give the Byzantine Rite a try to see if they'd like to come, and potentially become parishioners of an Eastern Church.

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I was a parishioner of St. Michael's Byzantine Catholic Church. Closing the church was sad , however we knew that we could no longer maintain a large building complex,i.e, school, rectory, worship space. On a small scale under Fr. Bob Stash's leadership the parishioners did reach out to the community. Most of the members will be at St. Nicholas's church Barberton, this Sunday celebrating St. Nicholas feast day. Some of us travel as far as Canton, Ohio. I plan to pick up some of the " babbas" for divine liturgy. Father Miron Kerul-Kmec, pastor of St.Nicholas and the parishioners have been very supportive. I am really excited about joining St. Nicholas and hope to help out in evangelization projects. I appreciated everyone's supportive comments and prayers. We will be okay and will grow.

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