Eastern Catholic Churches

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This article is about Eastern churches in full communion with the Catholic
Church. For other Eastern Christian churches, see Eastern Christianity. For
other uses of the term Eastern Catholic, see Eastern Catholic
(disambiguation).
"Greek Catholic Church" redirects here. For other uses, see Greek Catholic
Church (disambiguation).

Part of a series on
Particular churches sui iuris
of the Catholic Church

Latin cross and Byzantine Patriarchal cross

Particular churches are grouped by rite.
Latin Rite
Latin
Alexandrian Rite
1 Coptic Ethiopian Eritrean
Armenian Rite
• Armenian
Byzantine Rite
1 Albanian Belarusian Bulgarian Croatian
and Serbian Greek Hungarian Italo-
Albanian Macedonian Melkite
Romanian Russian Ruthenian Slovak
Ukrainian
East Syrian Rite
• Chaldean Syro-Malabar
West Syrian Rite
• Maronite Syriac Syro-Malankara
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The Eastern Catholic Churches or Oriental Catholic Churches, also
called the Eastern-rite Catholic Churches, Greek Catholic Churches,
and in some historical cases Uniate Churches,[a] are twenty-three Eastern
Christian particular churches sui iuris in full communion with the Pope in
Rome, as part of the worldwide Catholic Church. Headed by patriarchs,
metropolitans, and major archbishops, the Eastern Catholic Churches are
governed in accordance with the Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches,
although each church also has its own canons and laws on top of this, and
the preservation of their own traditions is explicitly encouraged. The total
membership of the various churches accounts for about 16 million,
according to the Annuario Pontificio (the annual directory of the Catholic
Church), thus making up about 1.5 percent of the Catholic Church, with the
rest of its more than 1.2 billion members belonging to the (Western) Latin
Church.

The coat of arms of one of the Eastern Catholic churches, the Maronite Church in
Lebanon, with motto in Latin and Syriac: "The glory of Lebanon is given to him" (Isaiah
35:2), applied to its leader, a Patriarch.
The Maronite Church is considered the only one of the Eastern Catholic
Churches to have always remained in full communion with the Holy See,
while most of the other churches unified from the 16th century onwards.
However, the Melkite Catholic Church and the Italo-Albanian Greek
Catholic Church also claim perpetual communion.
Full communion constitutes mutual sacramental sharing between the
Eastern Catholic Churches and the Latin Church, including Eucharistic
intercommunion. On the other hand, the liturgical traditions of the 23
Eastern Catholic churches, including Byzantine, Alexandrian, Armenian,
East Syrian, and West Syrian, are shared with other Eastern Christian
churches: the Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodox, the Assyrian Church of
the East, and the Ancient Church of the East. Although some theological
issues divide the Eastern Catholic churches from other Eastern Christian
ones, they do admit members of the latter to the Eucharist and the other
sacraments, as governed by Oriental canon law.[b]
Notably, many Eastern Catholic churches take a different approach to
clerical celibacy than the Latin Church does and allow the ordination of
married men to the priesthood (although not to episcopacy).
Eastern Catholic Churches have their origins in the Middle East, East
Africa, Eastern Europe and India. However, since the 19th century,
diaspora has spread to Western Europe, the Americas and Oceania in part
because of persecution, where eparchies have been established to serve
adherents alongside those of Latin Church dioceses. Latin Catholics in the
Middle East, on the other hand, are traditionally cared for by the Latin
Patriarchate of Jerusalem.

Patriarch Ignatius Joseph III Yonan of the Syriac Catholic Church, an Eastern Catholic
church based in Damascus, Syria, as seen during a conference about the "extermination
of Christians in the Near East" (2015).

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Terminology[edit]
See also: Catholic (term)
Although Eastern Catholics are in full communion with the Pope and
members of the worldwide Catholic Church,[c][d] they are not members of the
Latin Church, which uses the Latin liturgical rites, among which the Roman
Rite is the most widespread.[e] The Eastern Catholic churches are instead
distinct particular churches sui iuris, although they maintain full and equal,
mutual sacramental exchange with members of the Latin Church.
Rite or church[edit]
There are different meanings of the word rite. Apart from its reference to the
liturgical patrimony of a particular church, the word has been and is still
sometimes, even if rarely, officially used of the particular church itself. Thus
the term Latin rite can refer either to the Latin Church or to one or more of
the Western liturgical rites, which include the majority Roman Rite but also
the Ambrosian Rite, the Mozarabic Rite, and others.
In the 1990 Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches (CCEO),[5][6] the terms
autonomous Church and rite are thus defined:
A group of Christian faithful linked in accordance with the law by a hierarchy
and expressly or tacitly recognized by the supreme authority of the Church
as autonomous is in this Code called an autonomous Church (canon 27).[7]
1 A rite is the liturgical, theological, spiritual and disciplinary patrimony,
culture and circumstances of history of a distinct people, by which its
own manner of living the faith is manifested in each autonomous [sui
iuris] Church.
2 The rites treated in CCEO, unless otherwise stated, are those that arise
from the Alexandrian, Antiochene, Armenian, Chaldean and
 Constantinopolitan traditions" (canon 28)[8] (not just a liturgical
heritage, but also a theological, spiritual and disciplinary heritage
characteristic of peoples' culture and the circumstances of their
history).
When speaking of Eastern Catholic Churches, the Latin Church's 1983
Code of Canon Law (1983 CIC) uses the terms "ritual Church" or "ritual
Church sui iuris" (canons 111 and 112), and also speaks of "a subject of an
Eastern rite" (canon 1015 §2), "Ordinaries of another rite" (canon 450 §1),
"the faithful of a specific rite" (canon 476), etc. The Second Vatican Council
spoke of Eastern Catholic Churches as "particular Churches or rites".[9](n. 2)
In 1999, the United States National Conference of Catholic Bishops stated:
"We have been accustomed to speaking of the Latin (Roman or Western)
Rite or the Eastern Rites to designate these different Churches. However,
the Church's contemporary legislation as contained in the Code of Canon
Law and the Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches makes it clear that
we ought to speak, not of rites, but of Churches. Canon 112 of the Code of
Canon Law uses the phrase 'autonomous ritual Churches' to designate the
various Churches."[10] And a writer in a periodical of January 2006 declared:
"The Eastern Churches are still mistakenly called 'Eastern-rite' Churches, a
reference to their various liturgical histories. They are most properly called
Eastern Churches, or Eastern Catholic Churches."[11] However, the term
"rite" continues to be used. The 1983 CIC forbids a Latin bishop to ordain,
without permission of the Holy See, a subject of his who is "of an Eastern
rite" (not "who uses an Eastern rite", the faculty for which is sometimes
granted to Latin clergy).[12] Pope Benedict XVI wrote, in his 2007 motu
proprio Summorum Pontificum, that "any Catholic priest of the Latin rite",[f]
under certain conditions, "may use either" edition of the Roman Missal.[14]
Uniate[edit]
The term Uniat or Uniate applies to Eastern Catholic churches previously
part of Eastern or Oriental Orthodox churches or of the Assyrian Church of
the East. The term is sometimes considered to have a derogatory
connotation,[15][16] though it was occasionally used by Latin and Eastern
Catholics prior to the Second Vatican Council.[g] Official Catholic documents
no longer use the term due to its perceived negative overtones.[16] According
to John Erickson of Saint Vladimir's Orthodox Theological Seminary, "The
term 'uniate' itself, once used with pride in the Roman communion, had long
since come to be considered as pejorative. 'Eastern Rite Catholic' also was
no longer in vogue because it might suggest that the Catholics in question
differed from Latins only in the externals of worship. The Second Vatican
Council affirmed rather that Eastern Catholics constituted churches whose
vocation was to provide a bridge to the separated churches of the East."[19]
History[edit]
Background[edit]
Communion between Christian churches has been broken over matters of
faith, whereby each side accused the other of heresy or departure from the
true faith (orthodoxy). Communion has been broken also because of
disagreement about questions of authority or the legitimacy of the election
of a particular bishop. In these latter cases each side accused the other of
schism, but not of heresy.
Major breaches of communion:
Council of Ephesus (431 AD)[edit]
In 431 the Churches that accepted the teaching of the Council of Ephesus
(which condemned the views of Nestorius) classified as heretics those who
rejected the Council's statements. The Church of the East, which was
mainly under the Sassanid Empire, never accepted the council's views. It
later experienced a period of great expansion in Asia before collapsing after
the Mongol invasion of the Middle East in the 14th century.
Monuments of their presence still exist in China. Now they are relatively few
in numbers and are divided into Four Churches, of which the Chaldaean
Church, which is in communion with Rome, is the largest, while the territory
in India become under the direct jurisdiction of Pope. Later it received
autonomy to form Syro Malabar Church and others have recently split
between the Assyrian Church of the East and the Ancient Church of the
East.
Council of Chalcedon (451 AD)[edit]
In 451 those who accepted the Council of Chalcedon similarly classified
those who rejected it as Monophysite heretics. The Churches that refused
to accept the Council considered instead that it was they who were
orthodox; they reject the description Monophysite preferring instead
Miaphysite. They are often called, in English, Oriental Orthodox Churches,
to distinguish them from the Eastern Orthodox Churches.
This distinction, by which the words oriental and eastern that in themselves
have exactly the same meaning but are used as labels to describe two
different realities, is impossible to translate in most other languages, and is
not universally accepted even in English. These churches are also referred
to as pre-Chalcedonian or now more rarely as non-Chalcedonian or anti-
Chalcedonian. In languages other than English other means are used to
distinguish the two families of Churches. Some reserve the term "Orthodox"
for those that are here called "Eastern Orthodox" Churches, but members
of what are called "Oriental/Eastern Orthodox" Churches consider this illicit.
East–West Schism (1054)[edit]
The East–West Schism came about in the context of cultural differences
between the Greek-speaking East and Latin-speaking West and of rivalry
between the Churches in Rome, which claimed a primacy not merely of
honour but also of authority—and in Constantinople, which claimed parity
with Rome.[20] The rivalry and lack of comprehension gave rise to
controversies, some of which appear already in the acts of the Quinisext
Council of 692. At the Council of Florence (1431–1445), these
controversies about Western theological elaborations and usages were
identified as, chiefly, the insertion of "Filioque" into the Nicene Creed, the
use of unleavened bread for the Eucharist, Purgatory, and the authority of
the Pope.[h]
The schism is conventionally dated as occurring at 1054, when the
Patriarch of Constantinople, Michael I Cerularius, and the Papal Legate,
Humbert of Silva Candida, issued mutual excommunications. (In 1965
these excommunications were revoked by both Rome and Constantinople.)
In spite of that event, for many years both Churches continued to maintain
friendly relations and seemed to be unaware of any formal or final rupture.[22]
However, estrangement continued to grow. In 1190, Eastern Orthodox
theologian Theodore Balsamon who was patriarch of Antioch, wrote that
"no Latin should be given Communion unless he first declares that he will
abstain from the doctrines and customs that separate him from us".[23]
Later, Constantinople was sacked in 1204 by the Catholic armies of the
Fourth Crusade, whereas two decades previously the Massacre of the
Latins (i.e. Catholics) had occurred in Constantinople in 1182. Thus, by the
12th–13th centuries, the two sides had become openly hostile, each
considering that the other no longer belonged to the Church that was
orthodox and catholic. Over time, it became customary to refer to the
Eastern side as the Orthodox Church and the Western as the Catholic
Church, without either side thereby renouncing its claim to be the truly
orthodox or the truly catholic Church.
Attempts at restoring communion[edit]
 Major Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church
Within each Church, no longer in communion with the Church of Rome,
there arose a group that considered it important to restore that communion.
In 1438, the Council of Florence convened, which featured a strong
dialogue focused on understanding the theological differences between the
East and West, with the hope of reuniting the Catholic and Orthodox
churches.[24] Several eastern churches associated themselves with Rome,
forming Eastern Catholic Churches. The See of Rome accepted them
without requiring that they adopt the customs of the Latin Church, so that
they all have their own "liturgical, theological, spiritual and disciplinary
heritage, differentiated by peoples' culture and historical circumstances,
that finds expression in each sui iuris Church's own way of living the
faith".[25]
In 1993 the Joint International Commission for Theological Dialogue
Between the Catholic Church and the Orthodox Church submitted the
document Uniatism, method of union of the past, and the present search for
full communion, also known as the Balamand declaration, "to the authorities
of the Catholic and Orthodox Churches for approval and application,"[26]
which stated that initiatives that "led to the union of certain communities
with the See of Rome and brought with them, as a consequence, the
breaking of communion with their Mother Churches of the East ... took
place not without the interference of extra-ecclesial interests".[26](n. 8)
Likewise the commission acknowledged that "certain civil authorities [who]
made attempts" to force Eastern Catholics to return to the Orthodox Church
used "unacceptable means".[26](n. 11) The missionary outlook and proselytism
that accompanied the Unia[26](n. 10) was judged incompatible with the
rediscovery by the Catholic and Orthodox Churches of each other as Sister
Churches.[26](n. 12) Thus the commission concluded that the "missionary
apostolate ..., which has been called 'uniatism', can no longer be accepted
either as a method to be followed or as a model of the unity our Churches
are seeking."[26](n. 12)
At the same time, the Commission stated:
• that Eastern Catholic Churches, being part of the Catholic Communion,
have the right to exist and to act in response to the spiritual needs of
their faithful[26](n. 3)
• that Oriental Catholic Churches, which desired to re-establish full
communion with the See of Rome and have remained faithful to it,
have the rights and obligations connected with this communion[26](n. 16)
Emergence of Eastern Catholic churches[edit]

Monastery of Qozhaya in Kadisha Valley, the historical stronghold of the Maronite

Church
Most Eastern Catholic churches arose when a group within an ancient
church in disagreement with the See of Rome returned to full communion
with that see. The following Churches have been in communion with the
Bishop of Rome for a large part of their history:
• The Maronite Church, which has no counterpart in Byzantine, nor
Oriental, Orthodoxy. The Maronite Church has historical connections
to the Monothelite controversy in the 7th century. It affirmed unity with
the Holy See in 1181 during the Crusades.[citation needed]
• The Italo-Albanian Catholic Church, unlike the Maronite Church, uses the
same liturgical rite as the Eastern Orthodox Church.
• The Melkite Church considered itself in dual communion with Rome and
Constantinople until it split into Catholic and Orthodox bodies.
• The Armenian Church had included a long-standing minority that
accepted Roman Primacy while remaining within the Armenian
Church until the 18th century.
The canon law shared by all Eastern Catholic churches, CCEO, was
codified in 1990. The dicastery that works with the Eastern Catholic
churches is the Congregation for the Oriental Churches which, by law,
includes as members all Eastern Catholic patriarchs and major
archbishops.
Orientalium dignitas[edit]

Pope Leo XIII issued the apostolic constitution Orientalium dignitas. Photogram of the
1896 film Sua Santitá papa Leone XIII, the first time a Pope appeared on film.
On 30 November 1894 Pope Leo XIII issued the apostolic constitution
Orientalium dignitas in which he stated:
The Churches of the East are worthy of the glory and reverence that they
hold throughout the whole of Christendom in virtue of those extremely
ancient, singular memorials that they have bequeathed to us. For it was in
that part of the world that the first actions for the redemption of the human
race began, in accord with the all-kind plan of God. They swiftly gave forth
their yield: there flowered in first blush the glories of preaching the True
Faith to the nations, of martyrdom, and of holiness. They gave us the first
joys of the fruits of salvation. From them has come a wondrously grand and
powerful flood of benefits upon the other peoples of the world, no matter
how far-flung. When blessed Peter, the Prince of the Apostles, intended to
cast down the manifold wickedness of error and vice, in accord with the will
of Heaven, he brought the light of divine Truth, the Gospel of peace,
freedom in Christ to the metropolis of the Gentiles.[27]
Adrian Fortescue wrote that Leo XIII "begins by explaining again that the
ancient Eastern rites are a witness to the Apostolicity of the Catholic
Church, that their diversity, consistent with unity of the faith, is itself a
witness to the unity of the Church, that they add to her dignity and honour.
He says that the Catholic Church does not possess one rite only, but that
she embraces all the ancient rites of Christendom; her unity consists not in
a mechanical uniformity of all her parts, but on the contrary, in their variety,
according in one principle and vivified by it."[28]
Leo XIII declared still in force Pope Benedict XIV's encyclical Demandatam,
addressed to the Patriarch and the Bishops of the Melkite Catholic Church,
in which Benedict XIV forbade Latin Rite clergy to induce Melkite Catholics
to transfer to the Latin rite, and he broadened this prohibition to cover all
Eastern Catholics, declaring: "Any Latin rite missionary, whether of the
secular or religious clergy, who induces with his advice or assistance any
Eastern rite faithful to transfer to the Latin rite, will be deposed and
excluded from his benefice in addition to the ipso facto suspension a divinis
and other punishments that he will incur as imposed in the aforesaid
Constitution Demandatam."[27]
Second Vatican Council[edit]

Pope Paul VI presiding over the introductory ingress of the Second Vatican Council,
flanked by Camerlengo Benedetto Aloisi Masella and two Papal gentlemen.
Main article: Second Vatican Council
There had been confusion on the part of Western clergy about the
legitimate presence of Eastern Catholic Churches in countries seen as
belonging to the West, despite firm and repeated papal confirmation of
these Churches' universal character. The Second Vatican Council brought
the reform impulse to visible fruition. Several documents, from both during
and after the Second Vatican Council, have led to significant reform and
development within Eastern Catholic Churches.
Orientalium Ecclesiarum[edit]
 Bishops, including Eastern Catholic ones as seen in their distinctive robes, assisting at
the Second Vatican Council.
Main article: Orientalium Ecclesiarum
The Second Vatican Council directed, in Orientalium Ecclesiarum, that the
traditions of Eastern Catholic Churches should be maintained. It declared
that "it is the mind of the Catholic Church that each individual Church or
Rite should retain its traditions whole and entire and likewise that it should
adapt its way of life to the different needs of time and place" (n. 2), and that
they should all "preserve their legitimate liturgical rite and their established
way of life, and ... these may not be altered except to obtain for themselves
an organic improvement" (n. 6; cf. n. 22).[9]
It confirmed and approved the ancient discipline of the sacraments existing
in the Eastern churches, and the ritual practices connected with their
celebration and administration, and declared its ardent desire that this
should be re-established, if circumstances warranted (n. 12). It applied this
in particular to administration of sacrament of Confirmation by priests (n.
13). It expressed the wish that, where the permanent diaconate (ordination
as deacons of men who are not intended afterwards to become priests) had
fallen into disuse, it should be restored (n. 17).
Paragraphs 7–11 are devoted to the powers of the patriarchs and major
archbishops of the Eastern Churches, whose rights and privileges, it says,
should be re-established in accordance with the ancient tradition of each of
the Churches and the decrees of the ecumenical councils, adapted
somewhat to modern conditions. Where there is need, new patriarchates
should be established either by an ecumenical council or by the Bishop of
Rome.
Lumen gentium[edit]
The Second Vatican Council's Dogmatic Constitution on the Church, Lumen
gentium, deals with Eastern Catholic Churches in paragraph 23, stating:
By divine Providence it has come about that various churches, established
in various places by the apostles and their successors, have in the course
of time coalesced into several groups, organically united, which, preserving
the unity of faith and the unique divine constitution of the universal Church,
enjoy their own discipline, their own liturgical usage, and their own
theological and spiritual heritage. Some of these churches, notably the
ancient patriarchal churches, as parent-stocks of the Faith, so to speak,
have begotten others as daughter churches, with which they are connected
down to our own time by a close bond of charity in their sacramental life
and in their mutual respect for their rights and duties. This variety of local
churches with one common aspiration is splendid evidence of the catholicity
of the undivided Church. In like manner the Episcopal bodies of today are in
a position to render a manifold and fruitful assistance, so that this collegiate
feeling may be put into practical application.[29]