www.byzcath.org Forums Faith & Christian Life Parish Life & Evangelization Putting on armour before you need it

Congratulations.

My impatience with many of your posts is an impatience with shadow boxing. It does not interest me. If we are to fight let it be over something real. Otherwise, I'd rather fight evil rather than fight just to fight.

Dan L

I'm not quite getting the connection here. The success of the first can't becompared to the success of the second in terms of language only. The Slavs weren't Christian. We are opening Byz. Catholicism to a Christian English speaking country.

Cyril and Methodius brought the Faith to the Slavic people in their own tongue and converted millions. We brought the Faith to the US and basically haven't 'converted' more than a few hundred. Rather the opposite has happened and many of our own have gone elsewhere, to become more American, etc.
To remain totally with Church Slavonic would surely mean the end for us, IMHO. We are already viewed as a small, closed ethnic group. In that small closed ethnic group our 'own' people don't understand, were never really taught and have no desire to learn as a rule. Can we expect Church Slavonic to be any kind of a drawing card for potential converts? We'd be better off learning Espanol.

Sam

Sam,

Indeed you are correct. I doubt that I could have talked my wife into converting if we had been forced to not only learn an entire new liturgy but also learn to sound out a language we could not understand. I'm glad we sing some Slovanic each DL but I'm glad that we use English.

God has called us not to enforce the phonetics of Greek or Latin upon a people who know nothing of these languages. He has taught us from the beginning to teach in the Vernacular. Our anscestors fought a great battle through the work of Sts. Cyril and Methodius to insure that we use the vernacular. Patriarch Maximos IV Saigh had to refight that same battle in the 1960s to insure that we could use the vernacular. Why should we surrender the field now? We've won.

Now let us take the best light we have and reflect it into a world of darkness that others may come to know the fullness of Christ.

Dan Lauffer

A bishop is facing opposition for attempting to revitalize his own flock.
Thanks for my laugh of the day. He must KNOW he's doing something right!


Yes- lets just stop all of this August 6th business right now. We don't need this. We're fine just the way we are. why do we need to change the way we've always done things?

PA and NJ:
Do a little experiment in your parishes. Look at the people in your pews this Sunday. Think about their ages. Jump ahead 10 or 15 years. Now subtract them from the total. Whats left?
How many funerals do you average in a year? How many baptisms? Is it 10 to 1? Do the math.

Here is another math problem:
You have 75 families in your parish. Your church's electric bill is $XXXX. In ten years, doing the math above, your church will have 30-40 families. How much more will YOU have to pay to keep the lights on on Sunday? Insert "oil" in place of "electric". Calculate in costs of heating a rectory, parish hall, cemetery. Add salary/sustenance/ auto insurance, health insurance for your priest. Add insurance bills for your properties. Does the average $2 to $10 dollars you put in your envelope each week do anything to make a dent in these bills?

It is not all about the $$$, but when it comes right down to it- if you can't afford to keep your church you won't have one. Ten years goes by fast.

Don't criticize a bishop for trying to do something positive to keep us alive. Its better than a bishop who does nothing but wait it out to sell it off.


Sam

I have said it before, and will say it again. Getting behind Bishop John and supporting him will be one of the best things you can do for the future health of our church. He's trying to do something positive. If you don't support him, then "get thee behind him, Satan."

A hearty Byzantine Catholic "AMEN" to that!!!

BTW The hearty amen is another Catholic/Orthodox Tradition we're recapturing.


CDL