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We live in in a small rural town in N MN and live 4+ hours from the closest Byzantine Church. We have just learned my husband is Byzantine and we are enjoying this new gift in our spiritual lives.

We have been very active in our Latin faith all of our married lives and are beginning to wonder about how much may complement and what may contradict the Byzantine Church. For example: Extra-Ordinary Ministers of Holy Communion, Lector at Mass, Knights of Columbus, Third Orders Carmelites and Retreat Movements like, Koinonia, Curisslo, and Marriage Encounter.

We know this is a journey of faith and we will need to move one step at a time. We are not intending to remove ourselves from everything at once - we only want to know our direction to prayerfully set oursevles toward.

God Be Praised for all of you!

Extraordinary ministers of Communion and non-instituted lectors aren't complementary to any Rite!

Good luck on your journey!

Alexis

We are instituted Extra-Ordinary Ministers of Holy Communion and Lectors in our Latin Parish.

Let's deal with these one-by-one. Now I am not an authority, being a Latin Catholic, but I have come to learn much about the Byzantine Rite Catholics through the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church. So here's my take:

1.)Extra-ordinary ministers of Holy Communion exist only in the Latin Rite (to my knowledge). While they can be a great help to the priest, this is more often than not abused. According to canon law they are only to be used in situations where the ordained clergy cannot easily communicate the faithful in a respectable amount of time e.g. a parish with only one priest, no deacons, and several hundred people at Mass.

http://www.catholic-pages.com/mass/ministers.asp

2.) From what I have seen the Byzantine-Ukrainian Rite has Lectors/Readers at Mass, but these are closer to the office of Lector in the Traditional Latin Mass than in the Novus Ordo Mass. They are always male, and are usually installed into this position by the local bishop. As, well the whole idea of reading something, is really chanting it. Sadly, this is not the case in the Novus Ordo Mass.

3.) The Ukrainian Greek Catholic parish church near me has a Knights of Columbus Council. So there actually are Byzantine Rite Knights of Columbus!

4.) As for Third Orders, there is another thread on this forum about Byzantine Third Orders. I know that there are Byzantine Rite Franciscans (at Sybertsville http://hdbfm.com ), and if I remember correctly there are other Byzantine Rite houses of traditionally Western religious orders.

5.) Finally, on retreat movements I cannot speak. I think that the Basilians of St. Josaphat regularly conduct retreats, though. Here are some photos (there is one gallery that looks like it's of a retreat group):

http://www.osbm.in.ua/ukr/photo/

Although it was not asked let me put in my Orthodox 2 cents.
Firstly, the Orthodox Church does not have "mass", we celebrate the "Divine Liturgy". Why not use our terms. I keep reading about "Orthodox in union with Rome."

Secondly, if you are talking about commonly called cantors or tonsured "Readers" then yes, they are males if tonsured by the bishop.
However, at least in the Ukrainian Orthodox tradition in North America, your average parish cantor or diak is not tonsured and thus can be male or female.
In Ukraine right now the majority of the cantors are women. There are special courses, I believe from 3 to 4 years of seminary for women only to be cantors and choir directors at a few seminaries, the largest class being at the Odessa seminary.
I have also heard women cantors in Russian Orthodox churches and 1 in a Greek Orthodox Church.

Well, Olga, as I agree with the conservative posts in this thread I'm happy that, after finding out that canonical fact about your husband (how did you learn of this and only just now?), you're interested in learning more about the Byzantine Rite and possibly giving it a try.

One thought I had though is as it's obvious the Roman Rite has long been your and his real spiritual home I imagine if he chose to he could easily transfer to that rite canonically.

One reason the Byzantine Catholic churches appeal to Roman Catholics who want to try out this rite is one can remain in communion with one's local Roman Rite parish church.

I imagine in practice it doesn't really matter if you remain lectors and extraordinary ministers of Holy Communion at that parish.

What I wonder is, on paper, canonically, do you have to be a member of that parish to be enrolled as such? IOW following the rules does one have to be Roman Rite? I know that belonging to a different rite, a different church, from the Roman, such as one of the Byzantine ones, makes a difference canonically if you want to get married or be ordained. In those cases your canonical church claims you and the local Roman Riters can't do it. I think for weddings you have to get your canonical church's permission if you want the local Roman Rite priest to do it and for ordination you have to transfer into the Roman Rite. But on this I don't know.

(If you were married in the Roman Rite it's probably not a problem - certainly a valid sacramental marriage in the eyes of your church!)

So... on paper if your husband is Ruthenian Catholic for example then he wouldn't really belong to your local Roman parish or diocese but to the nearest Ruthenian one...

A sore point historically is many Roman Rite clergy haven't respected canon law and have signed up Byzantine Catholics in their parishes knowing they were Byzantine Catholics. Of course in your situation there are pastoral considerations (the Byzantine Rite church is more than four hours away?!) but I think many here will agree with me that it would be good to respect the claims of the Byzantine Catholics on one of their own people.

BTW I understand a few Byzantine Catholic churches have extraordinary ministers of the Eucharist which I'm not happy about - on top of the conservative Catholic objections to this practice, objections I agree with, it's another latinisation of these churches - but they are very rare. (As they were meant to be in the Roman Rite: that's what 'extraordinary' means here.) I've heard of one situation where it made sense even though it's not Byzantine Rite practice - the priest was crippled so some men in appropriate Eastern vestments did it.

In fact I have seen both terms used in the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, though the trend these days is to make the word "Mass" taboo for some reason. I have a few UGCC books that refer to "Mass" and "Sluzhba Bozha", yet mention the "Divine Liturgy" only once.

As well, I am a Latin Catholic, thus using the word "Mass" is my first instinct. I would take no offense at someone calling the Mass I attend on Sundays the "Divine Liturgy". Whether it is called the "Mass", "Sluzhba Bozha", or the "Divine Liturgy" it is all the same Sacrifice. People should not take offense over semantics.

Well, I am Eastern Orthodox and I do take offense greatly. It is not mere semantics. Why are you trying to force your Roman Catholic terminology on me? My Church has her own traditions and theology.
If you as a Roman Catholic cannot respect my Orthodox Church and my Orthodox Holy Tradition, then what is the point of ecumenical dialogue? And what is the point of this forum. All of us few Orthodox left can leave and then you can have your own Catholic forum using your Roman Catholic Tradition.

Have you contacted [http] the priest? He's the only one in the state and while I don't know exactly where you are, he's also the only one in the 5-state area. [parma.org] Had to look because while I was certain there wasn't a church in ND, I didn't know about WI.

When the Tsar spoke English he called it Mass.

There's no reason to pummel a newcomer for using the word she's always used for it.

But yes, in the Byzantine Rite it's the Divine Liturgy [home.att.net], Liturgy or even simply the Russian and Ukrainian word for 'service', sluzhba.

I feel like I am not hearing answers to my original question.

Having just realized my husband is Byzantine and unable to attend a weekly Divine Liturgy (the nearest being 4+ hrs away) we attend our local Latin Mass and we are heavily involved in our local parish. Does any of our involvemnt in our Latin parish contradict Byzantine traditions? That is what I need to know. Do we need to resign from any of our involvement in our parish?

Those are the questions I seek answers to.

In the Byzantine Rite the laity usually don't distribute Communion. But you're not at a Byzantine Rite church.

Do you need to resign from anything? Probably not.

Dear The young fogey,
Just to clarify that my comments were directed to Byzantophile not to Olga and I quoted Byzantophile. I believe Byzantophile is not a newcomer.
Also the fact that a tsar of Russia or a tsar of Bulgaria may have used the word "mass" in English is of little significance to me as an Orthodox Christian. I have never spoken to any tsar in English or in fact in any language.
I am glad that Olga did get answers to some of her concerns.

Orest,

Have you ever picked up that five-pounder Service Book that the Antiochian Orthodox Christians use here in the USA? Throughout that text, the sisters who translated it use the word "Mass."

After looking at that book, I accidentally using that word "Mass" and my fellow parishioners were aghast. When I explained to them that the five-pounder used that term, they said, "Yeah, sure!"

BACK TO THE TOPIC

A lot of folks have had to make adjustments when converting to the East - either to the Eastern Catholic or Eastern Orthodox Churches. However, the Lord offers His grace which is sufficient for us.

Dr. Scott Hahn gave us his pastorate to become a member of the Roman Catholic laity and was not ordained a priest. A female pastor had to give up pastoring her protestant church, before she could be chrismated. A former pastor accepted chrismation knowing that he would probably never be ordained. These are the sacrifices people willingly make for the sake of the truth.

Then I knew some visiting Roman Catholics who would not receive communion in the Byzantine Catholic Church because they wanted to receive communion in their hands, and so they walked out in the middle of the service and ran across the street to the Catholic Church. Then they were told by the Catholic pastor that the Melkites were not truly Catholic. Don't get me started.

So, yes, there is a difference in practice and in church discipline between the East and the West.

I remember too the time that a Catholic told me that she would never place herself in an embarrassing position. Thankfully, she had never witnessed the Pre-Sanctified Liturgy at an Eastern Church when people make prostrations. However, years ago, when my sister-in-law first saw the Melkites making a prostration during Great Lent, her face flushed as she said holding her cane, "Must I make a prostration too?"

Why should you have to resign? You are in communion with the Latin Church right?
I would make sure that you suppliment any of your chilrens religious education. And perhaps explain to some in that parish just want the Eastern Church is.
Stephanos I