Ruthenian Greek Catholic Church

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Ruthenian Greek Catholic Church
Latin Ecclesia Graeco-Catholica Ruthenica
Basic data
rite Byzantine rite
Liturgical language Church Slavonic , Ukrainian , Slovak , English
calendar Julian calendar
Establishment date April 23, 1646
Seat Eparchy Mukacheve ( Uzhhorod )
Hierarch Bishop of Mukacevo Sedisvakanz
statistics
Jurisdictions 7th
Believers 573,000
Bishops 8th
Parishes 660
Diocesan priest 508
Religious priest 52
Permanent deacons 76
Friars 71
Religious sisters 133
Status: 2014
Template: Infobox rite church / maintenance / picture is missing

The Ruthenian Greek Catholic Church or Ruthenian Church is a branch of the Roman Catholic Church . It is subject to their jurisdiction and recognizes the Pope as its spiritual head, but follows the Byzantine rite in the liturgy and in spiritual life ( Eastern Catholic Church ). The church comprises about 650,000 believers in the far west of the Ukraine , Slovakia , the Czech Republic and the diaspora church in the USA. Its headquarters are in Uzhhorod . The language of the liturgy is primarily Church Slavonic or a national language.

It is not identical to the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church and its forerunner, the Ruthenian Greek Catholic Church in the Kingdom of Poland-Lithuania .

history

The origins of the church lie in the eastern Carpathian regions of Carpathian Ukraine , eastern Slovakia and northeast Hungary . The Christian faith came here as early as the 9th century during the Great Moravian Empire . It probably followed the Byzantine tradition from the beginning, with the "Slav apostles" Cyril and Method being venerated as first publishers . A bishop of Mukacevo is documented in 1491.

In the 17th century almost the entire Hungarian region had become Protestant, in order to prevent the spread to the east, Rome tried to win over the Orthodox Ruthenians at the time. On April 24, 1646, at the end of the Thirty Years' War , 65 Orthodox priests in the Kingdom of Hungary in the Ecclesiastical Union of Uzhhorod committed themselves to the Catholic Church. Other regional unions followed in 1664 and 1713. Around 100 years later there were almost no Orthodox believers in this area (therefore, unlike most other Greek Catholic churches, there is no longer a “Ruthenian Orthodox Church”).

In the centuries that followed, the Ruthenian Catholics had no structure of their own, as the Ruthenian priests were considered to be the chaplains of the Latin pastors and their bishop in Mukachevo was only the ritual vicar of the Latin bishop of Eger . It was not until the request of Empress Maria Theresa that Pope Clement XIV in 1771 got the Ruthenian Church in Mukachevo to have its own eparchy . Seven years later they received their own seminary in Uzhhorod .

The strong emigration of the early 20th century created a powerful diaspora in the USA. After the Second World War , the Ruthenians were systematically persecuted by the rulers of the Soviet Union , the seminary was closed in 1946 and the church was forcibly merged with the Russian Orthodox Church in 1949.

After the collapse of the Soviet Union , the communities flourished again; In 1997 there were 264 parishes and 141 priests in the Mukacheve eparchy. In 1995 a new seminary was set up in Uzhhorod.

Characteristic

The Ruthenian Catholic Church has a special position among the Byzantines in Eastern Europe, since the Ruthenian culture (Russians) never established a nation-state. In principle, Church Slavonic is characteristic of the Ruthenian Church as the liturgical language ; Ruthenian is its original vernacular and the forerunner of Ukrainian , Belarusian and Russian . In the motherland, the community today has to constantly defend itself against being taken over by the Ukrainian Catholic Church . In addition, the underground years have led to alienation and separation, so that their exarchate in Prešov has been the seat of a new, Slovak Greek-Catholic Church since 1996 (Slovak-Ruthenian parishes only remain in the Czech Republic), and the exarchate Miskolc belongs to the Hungarian Church .

Today there are around 663,000 believers living in the Ukraine , the Czech Republic and the USA . They are divided into three metropolises.

  1. The Mukacheve eparchy has 380,000 believers; The seat of the bishop is Uzhhorod. The Apostolic Exarch of Mukachevo, whose territory is in Ukraine, reports directly to the Holy See and has no suffragans . Compared to the other two metropolitans, it enjoys priority of honor, but has no legal primacy.
  2. The Apostolic Exarchate of the Czech Republic with 180,000 believers and its headquarters in Prague was established in 1996. Before that, the Czech believers belonged to the Prešov eparchy in Slovakia .
  3. The Byzantine Catholic Metropolitan Church `` sui iuris '' of Pittsburgh includes four dioceses ( Passaic , Pittsburgh , Parma and Phoenix ) with 243 parishes and around 90,000 believers. The Metropolitan Archbishop has his seat in Pittsburgh. The faithful celebrate their services mainly in English. Today the church is independent and legally independent from the European mother church. The priests have been allowed to be married again since 1999.

The Apostolic Exarchate Miskolc was founded on June 4, 1924 for the 21 parishes of the Ruthenians in Hungary . Since these soon switched to the Hungarian liturgy, it has been administered since then by the Hungarian Eparchen, the bishop of Hajdúdorog , and in recent years has also been formally counted as part of the Hungarian Greek Catholic Church .

Important persons

see also category: Ruthenian Greek Catholic Bishop

Individual evidence

  1. ^ The Eastern Catholic Churches 2014. Catholic Near East Welfare Association, accessed February 10, 2015 .
  2. a b c d e Entry on Ruthenian Greek Catholic Church in Pro Oriente
  3. ^ Greek Catholic Church in Hungary , prooriente.at

Web links

Coordinates: 48 ° 37 ′ 23.5 "  N , 22 ° 18 ′ 7.7"  E