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What has been the outcome of Vatican holding a conference to examine [after 10 years] The Code of Cannon Law for the Eastern Churches? I knew it was to start on the 15th of November but have not heart anything since???

Servant of God,

Willie

Here is the story that came out on the Catholic News Service today:

Eastern canon law designed to protect identity, heritage, pope says


By Cindy Wooden Catholic News Service


VATICAN CITY (CNS) -- The Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches was designed to promote a "tranquility of order" faithful to the heritage of the Eastern Catholic churches, Pope John Paul II said.

Marking the 10th anniversary of the Eastern code, the pope said fidelity to the ancient liturgies, disciplines and practices of the Christian East does not harm the unity of the church, but deepens it.

Pope John Paul spoke Nov. 23 at a symposium attended by the top leadership and canon lawyers from the 21 Eastern churches in full communion with Rome.

The pope praised the symposium for encouraging Eastern Catholics to "intensify fraternal relations with other Christians and, in particular, with the Orthodox churches" who share the same liturgies and traditions.

"I express the hope that the journey of reconciliation between the East and West is a constant concern and priority for you as it is for the bishop of Rome," he said, referring to himself.

Pope John Paul said he had asked Cardinal Angelo Sodano, Vatican secretary of state, to reflect with symposium participants on some of the principal concerns Eastern Catholics have with the new code.

Cardinal Sodano, who spoke Nov. 22, focused on questions about the authority of the pope and the Eastern patriarchs as well as about the territorial limits on the jurisdiction of patriarchs and Eastern synods of bishops.

While bishops of the Eastern church are the heads of their eparchies or dioceses, they also promise obedience to the patriarch of their churches, Cardinal Sodano said. But that promise of obedience does not imply that the patriarch's authority over other bishops is the same as the pope's supreme authority over all the bishops of the church, he said.

While the pope's authority was willed by Christ, the cardinal said, the authority of the patriarchs and patriarchal synods is delegated by canon law.

Some Eastern Catholic leaders and theologians, as well as experts in ecumenism, have been discussing the lines of authority within the church, the relationship between bishops and the pope before the Great Schism of 1054 and possible models for the future.

While Cardinal Sodano insisted the universal authority of the pope as successor of Peter was willed by Christ, others have argued that, while the pope holds a place of honor among all the bishops, his jurisdictional authority should be only as patriarch of the West.

On the question of territoriality, Cardinal Sodano said the new code foresaw the possibility of extending the territory over which Eastern patriarchs and synods have direct authority, but that the Eastern Catholic patriarchs and the majority of Eastern Catholic scholars involved in drafting the code rejected the idea of completely doing away with territorial limits.

Within their traditional territories, the Eastern Catholic synods elect their own bishops, erect dioceses and make other decisions; but the same decisions for the pastoral care of members of their church living outside the church's traditional homeland are made by the pope or the Vatican.

Cardinal Sodano said the territorial limits on patriarchal powers respects the tradition of the Eastern churches and facilitates coordination in places where the faithful of more than one rite live.

END

The Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches is a wonderful document; it represents the epitome of current "legal thinking" in the world and attempts to codify the thinking and behavior of all Christ's Eastern Children.

Unfortunately, it is based upon the premise (held by lawyers universally!!) that human behavior can be put down in words. Silly lawyers! Despite the poll takers, sociologists, psycholgists, psychiatrists, demographers, etc., folks have a remarkable way of doing what they want to, either in conformity with or outside conformity with the prevailing wisdom.

Eastern folks are messy. (Sorry, my German genes go freakin' NUTS over this!!!) But, that's the way we are. To say that this, that or the other law, trait, custom or behavior is "normative" is just not applicable to us and is just outside the paradigm. We're too complicated for descriptive paradigms. And so are a lot of other "defined sociological groups". (Sociologists and canon lawyers may well fall upon their swords at this truth. Sorry.)

While the Roman Church tried to give us a most wonderful gift with this Canon Law, it's like giving a paraplegic person a pair of running shoes or a diabetic a box of chocolates. The thought is most wonderful, but it is useless for our day-to-day lives.

We'll do OK as long as our brethren allow us to do what we need to do to both survive and to prosper, and not to take offense if we say "Thanks!!" and put the gift on the bookcase shelf.

Our bishops and spiritual leaders have the ability (through the grace of the Holy Spirit!!-- yeah, we've got that!!!) to guide us. To suggest that one book is going to guide Ruthenians, Armenians and Ethiopians is just stupid. Sheesh! What do the Ethiopians know of kocherina? Or Souvalaki or our beloved Saint Panteleimon? Or Europeans know of falafel or Coptic flat-bread and Pontius Pilate as a possible saint?

Queer customs? Yeah. Weird ceremonies? Yeah. But us Easterns are just willing to let it go and give our baptized brethren the benefit of the doubt.

Last evening PBS broadcast a most wonderful documentary on the Papacy. It was glorious! Replete with ceremonial, history, pomp, pageantry, and all the other good stuff. And, while I was happy to feel "Catholic", I was also aware of the fact that this was "them" and I was "us" -- in communion, but not "of them".

OK?

Blessings!

Dear Dr. John,

Actually, sociologists are the ones who study human social behaviour as it is in the real world.

We also study the others you mention, including theologians.

God bless,

Alex

Who were these so-called "Eastern Catholic" patriarchs and scholars?

[ 11-29-2001: Message edited by: Dragani ]

OK, beloved Ukie-phile, Alex. But one has to admit that any social science (including your beloved sociologists) must establish a framework and parameters within which the research is to be done. (Otherwise, it's not scientific, but anecdotal.)

My problem is: when establishing the "framework", what cognitive elements are used as the foundational points? And are these points "Eastern" or "Western"?

While Canon Lawyers LOVE to set up the parameters, they are forced to rely upon what they perceive as realitites. But the experiences and decisions of people oftentimes contradict the basic assumptions of the testing-social-scientists.

For example: who'd have suspected that Greeks would look at Ukrainians as 'allies'? The Russians did their part in defending the Konstantinopoli against the Ottomans. And the Greeks revere the Russians -- as a general concept. However, the fact that there a very many Ukrainians living in Greece has undermined this basic assumption because the Ukrainians are seen as "independence lovers" and fellow-mountain-people. Thus, Ukrainian concepts of sloughing off Russian hegemony are going to ring true to Greeks and the Ukies are going to have a very major influence on the ways that Greeks view the Slavic brethren. I.e., maybe the Great Russians helped Greece 200 years ago, but the Ukies are "among us" here and now.

What questions would one ask of Greeks, for example, to determine how Greeks feel about their various Slavic brethren? If one asks about Russians, then the response would be quite good. But if one asked about the Ukrainians, the response would also be very good, even in light of the fact that the Ukrainians are not about to subordinate themselves to the Great Russian "New (Orthodox) World Order" and make no bones about it.

T'is a puzzlement as the King of Siam would say.

Just a thought.

Blessings!

The Ukrainian Metropolitan of Winipeg has been the most outspoken on this, a lot of the North American Melkites as well.

Kurt

Kurt,

Actually, I was referring to those "Eastern Catholic Patriarchs and scholars" who supposedly requested that the territorial limits remain in force. According to Cardinal Sodano, the commission that drafted the Code considered doing away with the territorial limits, but these elusive "Patriarchs and scholars" insisted upon retaining them. Thus, these fellows sold out their own Churches and severely limited the authority of their own Patriarchs, giving the authority to the Roman Curia instead. Personally, I find this incredible to believe.

It is my understanding that the Melkites (and presumably the very Eastern Metropolitan of Winnipeg) would like to do away with the territorial limits. This is what you meant, right?

Also, getting rid of these territorial limits is an ecumenical imperative. The Eastern Orthodox would never reunite with Rome given such a condition. The territorial limits reflect a "reservation" mentality, in which we are allowed to practice our funny Eastern ways provided that we remain on the reservation. Once we leave the reservation, we are in Roman territory and our rights and priveleges no longer apply.

God Bless,
Anthony

P.S. I hear that you are going to be at the St. Nicholas banquet. I'll be there too. It would be great to meet you in person.

Could some one please tell me why it is so hard to get a copy of 'The Code Of Canon Law for the Eastern Churches'. To oder it on-line is impossible. I, as well as many others have tried to order it. If I remember correctly, when you fill out the order form it asks what organization you belong to. If you leave it blank or fill in something it will not take it. There is a priest friend of mine, as well as myself, who has been trying to buy one for years without success. Why is it so hard to do?

OrthoMan

Dear Anthony,

Excellent point!

The movement for a patriarchate within the Ukrainian Catholic Church has been quite obsessed with the issue of territory.

Those priests and bishops who are against a Patriarchate often argue that it would be useless anyway since its jurisdiction would only extend over the Church in western Ukraine, even with the Synod of Bishops worldwide.

Previously, they argued that a Patriarchate could not exist in Ukraine as long as it was under communism since "patria" (as part of "patriarchate" didn't exist) - I kid you not.

Sometimes one got the impression that certain bishops were against a Patriarchate for the Ukrainian Church not because of issues of jurisdiction for the future Patriarch, but that somehow such a Patriarchate might negatively impact the bishop's immediate jurisdiction over his Eparchy and that the preferred status was "directly under Rome."

Even though today we call the Major Archbishop of L'viv a "Patriarch," we still act with a colonial mentality.

For example, when the Patriarch and his Synod issued a new, updated Ukrainian translation of the Liturgy and other prayers, a number of eparchies and individual parishes in the West refused to adopt them.

At first, they argued that there were theological errors in the transliteration. For example, "the eternal ages" in the new translation was not the proper translation for the old "the ages of ages."

Personally, I don't see a problem there . . .

It became apparent that they didn't like the modern Ukrainian because they feel it to be the "profane language of the common folk" and, secondly, because it was too close to the wording of the Ukrainian Orthodox Churches.

Latinization is having your own bishops do Rome's work for you. Some of them would oppose greater Byzantinization even if the Pope himself commanded it as a direct order. . .

Please say hello to Kurt for me too. We had a dust-up this week over the Romanovs.

Please let him know that I think he fights like a gentleman!

Alex

I obtained my copy of the Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches at the Catholic University bookstore when I took the overview class.

Check out:

http://studentlife.cua.edu/handbook/content/campus_bookstore.cfm

You can probably call them and place the order with a credit card.

Blessings!

The new edition is available from Byzantine Seminary Press (you can link from this site for contact info), or directly from the Canon Law Society at www.clsa.org. [clsa.org.] The cost is about $60 plus shipping.

ICXC NIKA

Gregory

I concur with Alex that it was certainly some of the Ukrainian bishops and clergy on the committee for the revision of the Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches that would have opposed the extension of territory for the Eastern patriarchs. I believe that this is what was intended when it was mentioned on this thread, that the Metropolitan of Winnipeg and some Melkites were against such an extension.

Certainly, after many decades in the US and Canada, many in the Greek Catholic churches have become comfortable with the idea of being "subject directly to Rome" and admittedly, the thought of being accountable to so-called "old country" patriarchs is threatening to these people. It also seems to be a trend, that those who would support remaining subject directly to the Holy See also tend to be latinizers in one way or another, and ultramontane in their ecclesiology.

For the Ruthenians, the idea of patriarchal inclusion is more or less a moot point, since attempts to gather the church of the Carpathians into unity with their cousins in Western Ukraine have never been successful. This is an issue in and of itself and the subject of much controversy on both sides. Movements in this venue during past centuries in the Carpatho-Rusyn homeland always met with opposition, primarily from government authorities (the Hungarians, in Subcarpathian Rus') who felt threatened by the idea of a stronger, more united Greek Catholic Church and a more culturally aware "peasantry" (as they saw the Rusyn people).

Thus, the two sectors of the "Ruthenian" {as they were both known until the middle of the last century} Church have remained divided, both in the countries of origin and the Diaspora. A unique experiment of a common jurisdiction was actually operative in the United States until 1914, at which time there was the appointment of separate administrators for faithful coming from Subcarpathia and Galicia.

So, I believe that there is good reason to suspect that certain Eastern Catholic members of the revision committee would have been against the extension of the traditional territories of the patriarchs, rooted in their fear of subjugation to hierarchs of their own ritual tradition rather than the ominous Holy See. This would have been inconceivable and unprecedented in the experience of many Eastern priests and bishops.

Those looking to purchase the "Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches" can also receive it from Byzantine Seminary Press in Pittsburgh, by calling the number given on their page at this website. I always like to support our own first, if possible, since it is well known that the proceeds support the operation of our seminary in Pittsburgh. It is also on the shelf of many Catholic bookstores, particularly I have seen, at those operated by the Daughters of St. Paul.

[ 11-30-2001: Message edited by: Joe ]