Sviatoslav Shevchuk, 40, new major archbishop (patriarch) of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church

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Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk, 40, is the new head of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church of 6 million people worldwide. The Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church is the largest Eastern Church in communion with the See of Rome. The election happened on March 23. In Canon Law he holds the title of Major Archbishop (that is, he has the responsibility that a patriarch would have but not the title, though many in the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church unofficially use the title, see canon 151 of the CCEO). The election was done by 40 bishops from around the world.

Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk, until now, is the Apostolic Administrator of the Eparchy of the Protection of the Theotokos, Buenos Aires, Argentina. Prior to his South American work, the Archbishop was the personal secretary of the former head of the Church, His Beatitude, Lubomyr, from 2002-05.

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At Shevchuk’s election he had to write a letter in his own hand to the Pope requesting communion with the Apostolic See. In accordance with canon 153 of the Code of Canons of the Eastern Church reads:
1. A major archbishop is elected according to the norm of cann. 63-74.
2. After acceptance of the election, the synod of bishop of the major archepiscopal Church must notify the Roman Pontiff through a synodal letter about the canonical conduct of the election; however, the one who of is elected, in a letter signed in his own hand, must petition the confirmation of his election from the Roman Pontiff.
3. After having obtained the confirmation, the one who is elected, in the presence of the synod of bishops of the major archepiscopal Church, must make a profession of faith and promise to carry out faithfully his office; afterwards his proclamation and enthronment are to be performed. If, however, the one who is elected is not yet an ordained bishop, the enthronment cannot validly be done before he receives episcopal ordination.
4. If however the confirmation is denied, a new election is to be conducted within the time established by the Roman Pontiff.

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Béshara Raï elected new Maronite Patriarch

Beshara Rai.jpegOnly 20 years junior to the out-going patriarch, His Beatitude Nasrallah Peter Sfeir, the Maronite bishops elected today Bishop Béshara Raï, 71, as the new patriarch. He’s  77th patriarch of the Maronites; Raï takes up the See of St Peter (Peter’s first diocese before moving to Rome), adopting the name Peter. He will be known as “His Beatitude, Patriarch Béshara Peter Raï.

He succeeds Patriarch Sfeir after his 25 years of service. It is expected that Patriarch Béshara Peter will be enthroned on 25 March.

I am happy for His Beatitude’s new opportunity to serve the Church. I met him a number of years ago and he’s a wonderful person.
His Beatitude has been a priest for 43 years and a bishop for nearly 25 years and since 1990 he’s been bishop of Jbeil (Byblos). In Lebanon, the Maronite Christians number about a third of the 4 million population.

Patriarch Nasrallah Peter Sfeir, retires as Maronite leader

Sfeir.jpgToday, Pope Benedict XVI accepted the petition of His Beatitude, Patriarch Nasrallah Peter Sfeir, cardinal, to retire from his pastoral leadership as the Father of Maronite Church.

The resignation was speculated a few weeks ago.

Here is the letter of Pope Benedict to His Beatitude (in French until an English translation is given).

Transitioning from Husar to new era in the Ukrainian Church …?

Husar and Voznyak.jpgIn the past weeks we’ve seen the Pontiff accepting the resignation of His Beatitude Cardinal Lubomyr Husar, 78, as the Major Archbishop of the Ukrainian Catholic Church. Bishop Ihor Voznyak is the temporary administrator of the Church until a new leader is elected.

The Ukrainian Church is the largest of the Eastern Catholic Churches with its own tradition, law, discipline, and customs; in Church law we’d call the Ukrainian Church an Ecclesia sui juris. As a note, the Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church is alternately called the Union Church, Ukrainian Catholic Church, Ukrainian Catholic Church of the Byzantine Rite or the Kyivan Catholic Church. Empress Maria Theresa introduced the designation of Greek-Catholic in the title of the Church in 1774. In 1999, the Synod of Bishops introduced the name “Kyivan Catholic Church.”

Continue reading Transitioning from Husar to new era in the Ukrainian Church …?

Lubomyr Cardinal Husar, MSU, Major Archbishop of the Ukrainian Catholic Church, retires

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His Beatitude, Lubomyr Cardinal Husar, MSU, 78, retired from serving the Ukrainian Catholic Church today. The Holy Father accepted the Cardinal’s request to retired due to health concerns. He has served the Church in his present position since 2001.
His Beatitude has been a bishop since 1977. Husar has done a terrific job for the Church these past years and is owed a debt of gratitude.
The Cardinal has a terrific sense of humor, friendly and insightful. My sadness is that he never was granted the title of Patriarch, a title he’s entitled to use given the state of his Church but the pope’s have been reticent to grant the patriarch’s title in fear of what the Russian Orthodox Church would say.
CNS’ Cindy Wooden’s article on His Beatitude’s resignation; looking to the future…

Maronite Patriarch said ready to resign

Patriarch Nasrallah Peter Sfeir.jpgPatriarch Nasrallah Peter Sfeir, 90, the 76th head of the Maronite Church is said to have submitted a resignation a few months ago to His Holiness, Pope Benedict XVI. The Daily Star has stated this move of Sfeir’s, but the paper has several facts wrong, so the reliability of specifics is questionable.

His Beatitude will be 91 on May 15 and has led the Maronite Church since 1986: he’s been a priest for 60.5 years, a bishop for 49.5 years and patriarch for 25 years. Sfeir is also a cardinal of the Church since 1994.

Saint Andrew: the Ecumenical agenda

Constantinople & Rome.JPGSaint Andrew is the first of the 12 Apostles called by Jesus to follow Him. Today is his feast day, the day traditionally remembered as the day of his death.

Official delegations of prayer and fraternal exchange happen for the June feast of Saints Peter and Paul (in Rome) and for today’s feast of Saint Andrew (in Constantinople). The protocol followed is that Patriarch Bartholomew I sends a message and a group to Rome in June and the Pope does the same on November 30 for today’s feast. Often there’s a series of meetings, discussions, academic exchanges, and a festive meal. Kurt Cardinal Koch and Bishop Brian Farrell, LC, (president and secretary of the Pontifical Council for Christian Unity) represented the Holy Father today.

The meeting was covered by Vatican Radio. Visit here.
 
The Catholic News Agency reports that the Pope is urging greater efforts to realize unity between the Catholic and Orthodox Churches.
The Pope’s message to the Patriarch: Benedict XVI to Bartholomew I Nov 30 2010.pdf

Bartholomew takes on critics of dialog, establishes Orthodox concern for Church unity

I’ve provided here excerpts of Bartholomew I’s Patriarchal and Synodal Encyclical, published on the Sunday of Orthodoxy (February 21, 2010). The letter was not only published under the name of Patriarch Bartholomew, but it was signed by 12 other bishops. The Patriarch is obviously trying to calm the irrational fears stirred up by some extreme Orthodox thinkers. No doubt there are significant, well-crafted –though ludicrous–objections to the dialogic process between the churches.

 

Catholics have their own irrational critics of the ecumenical movement, but I think there is sometimes good reason for the ecumenical leaders to pay attention to thoughtful criticism. I think we have been saddled with misguided “ecumenists” who capitulate to others some substantial matters like the nature of truth, morals, the sacred Liturgy, dogma, ecclesiology, teaching authority, etc.

 

But with this patriarchal letter, Bartholomew sets the stage for thinking intelligently and faithfully in an effort to work toward unity among Christians, without which the Christian witness to Christ as Lord and Savior and the sacramentality of the Church is weakened. There are matters raised by the critics that need to be dealt with directly, like: To what end do the dialogues aim? Is full, visible unity possible, or are we wasting our time? Can a selective reading of history be set aside and real scholarship emerge to shed light on historical events and gestures and theological reflection? How do we discern the work of the Holy Spirit in the dialogues? Are truth claims made by the Churches (Rome and Constantinople) accurate and faithful to the Lord? Are the bishops obstructionists or men of good will?

 

Funny, this letter will be read by the Catholic world on the ancient feast of the Chair of Peter on who whose witness we rely on for Christian unity. Would that the irony might be an opportunity for more concrete expressions unity of life in Christ. What Bartholomew says of the Orthodox Church is applicable to the Roman Church. Emphasis is mine.

 

May Saint Peter and Saint Andrew with Mary, Mother of God, pray for us. 

 

Bartholomew I.jpgWith a sense of duty and responsibility, despite its hurdles and problems, as the First-Throne Church of Orthodoxy, the Ecumenical Patriarchate cares about protecting and establishing the unity of the Orthodox Church, in order that with one voice and in one heart we may confess the Orthodox faith of our Fathers in every age and even in our times. For, Orthodoxy is not a museum treasure that must be preserved; it is a breath of life that must be transmitted and invigorate all people. Orthodoxy is always contemporary, so long as we promote it with humility and interpret it in light of the existential quests and needs of humanity in each historical period and cultural circumstance.

 

To this purpose, Orthodoxy must be in constant dialogue with the world. The Orthodox Church does not fear dialogue because truth is not afraid of dialogue. On the contrary, if Orthodoxy is enclosed within itself and not in dialogue with those outside, it will both fail in its mission and no longer be the “catholic” and “ecumenical” Church. Instead, it will become an introverted and self-contained group, a “ghetto” on the margins of history. This is why the great Fathers of the Church never feared dialogue with the spiritual culture of their age – indeed even with the pagan idolaters and philosophers of their world – thereby influencing and transforming the civilization of their time and offering us a truly ecumenical Church.

 

Today, Orthodoxy is called to continue this dialogue with the outside world in order to provide a witness and the life-giving breath of its faith. However, this dialogue cannot reach the outside world unless it first passes through all those that bear the Christian name. Thus, we must first converse as Christians among ourselves in order to resolve our differences, in order that our witness to the outside world may be credible. Our endeavors for the union of all Christians is the will and command of our Lord, who before His Passion prayed to His Father “that all [namely, His disciples] may be one, so that the world may believe that You sent me.” (John 17.21) It is not possible for the Lord to agonize over the unity of His disciples and for us to remain indifferent about the unity of all Christians. This would constitute criminal betrayal and transgression of His divine commandment.

 

It is precisely for these reasons that, with the mutual agreement and participation of all local Orthodox Churches, the Ecumenical Patriarchate has for many decades conducted official Panorthodox theological dialogues with the larger Christian Churches and Confessions. The aim of these dialogues is, in a spirit of love, to discuss whatever divides Christians both in terms of faith as well as in terms of the organization and life of the Church.

 

These dialogues, together with every effort for peaceful and fraternal relations of the Orthodox Church with other Christians, are unfortunately challenged today in an unacceptably fanatical way – at least by the standards of a genuinely Orthodox ethos – by certain circles that exclusively claim for themselves the title of zealot and defender of Orthodoxy. As if all the Patriarchs and Sacred Synods of the Orthodox Churches throughout the world, who unanimously decided on and continue to support these dialogues, were not Orthodox. Yet, these opponents of every effort for the restoration of unity among Christians raise themselves above Episcopal Synods of the Church to the dangerous point of creating schisms within the Church.

 

In their polemical argumentation, these critics of the restoration of unity among Christians do not even hesitate to distort reality in order to deceive and arouse the faithful. Thus, they are silent about the fact that theological dialogues are conducted by unanimous decision of all Orthodox Churches, instead attacking the Ecumenical Patriarchate alone. They disseminate false rumors that union between the Roman Catholic and Orthodox Churches is imminent, while they know well that the differences discussed in these theological dialogues remain numerous and require lengthy debate; moreover, union is not decided by theological commissions but by Church Synods. They assert that the Pope will supposedly subjugate the Orthodox, because they latter submit to dialogue with the Roman Catholics! They condemn those who conduct these dialogues as allegedly “heretics” and “traitors” of Orthodoxy, purely and simply because they converse with non-Orthodox, with whom they share the treasure and truth of our Orthodox faith. They speak condescendingly of every effort for reconciliation among divided Christians and restoration of their unity as purportedly being “the pan-heresy of ecumenism” without providing the slightest evidence that, in its contacts with non-Orthodox, the Orthodox Church has abandoned or denied the doctrines of the Ecumenical Councils and of the Church Fathers.

 

Beloved children in the Lord, Orthodoxy has no need of either fanaticism or bigotry to protect itself. Whoever believes that Orthodoxy has the truth does not fear dialogue, because truth has never been endangered by dialogue. By contrast, when in our day all people strive to resolve their differences through dialogue, Orthodoxy cannot proceed with intolerance and extremism. You should have utmost confidence in your Mother Church. For the Mother Church has over the ages preserved and transmitted Orthodoxy even to other nations. And today, the Mother Church is struggling amid difficult circumstances to maintain Orthodoxy vibrant and venerable throughout the world.

Moscow & Rome to meet soon?

Patriarch & Pope.jpgDo you read the Interfax news agency from Moscow. Every now-and-again you should just to keep up with news not seemingly connected with own. Today, Interfax is reporting that Archbishop Hilarion has indicated that a meeting between Russian Orthodox Patriarch Kyrill and Pope Benedict XVI is on the table. No definite plans appear to have been made but there seem to be significant discussions pointing to a meeting. Interesting that this announcement is on the liturgical memorial of Saint Josaphat, brutally martyred by the Ordthodx (on the Latin calendar).