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Photo: Pope Francis and Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I embrace.
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Uniontown, PA - The annual Pilgrimage in honor of Our Lady of Perpetual Help is a special ministry of the Sisters of St. Basil. It has been held every Labor Day weekend since 1934. It was that year that the Sisters and pilgrims celebrated the blessing of the then newly acquired Monastery for the Sisters.
In 1935, Pope Pius XI gifted the Sisters with a beautiful icon of Our Lady of Perpetual Help requesting that they spread devotion to the Theotokos under that title.
The Pilgrimage is a source of ongoing renewal and provides for the diverse spiritual needs of the many pilgrims who frequent this major unifying event in the life of the Byzantine Catholic Church. Its participants include clergy and faithful from across the country. The Pilgrimage offers the celebration of Divine Liturgy; opportunities for the Mystery of Reconciliation; Anointing of the Sick; Adult Enrichment Programs; activities for children, teens, young adults; and pastoral counseling.
The Pilgrimage is the oldest and largest Byzantine Catholic Pilgrimage in the United States. The Sisters welcome all people of faith to share in this special ministry and in its many blessings.
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Fairfax, VA – The 28th Annual Orientale Lumen Conference will be held “in-person” and “virtual” on June 17-20, 2024, at the Washington Retreat Center near the St. John Paul II Shrine in Washington, DC. The theme will be “Primacy in the 21st Century” reflecting on the last three agreed statements of the Orthodox-Catholic Theological Dialogue: Ravenna in 2007 (Sacramental Nature of the Church), Chieti in 2006 (Synodality and Primacy During the First Millennium), and Alexandria in 2023 (Synodality and Primacy in the Second Millennium and Today).
The following speakers will give lectures: 1) Metropolitan Job of Pisidia, Orthodox Co-Chair of the international dialogue (remote); 2) Bishop John Michael Botean, Romanian Catholic Eparchy of Canton, OH; 3) Msgr. Paul McPartlan, Professor Emeritus of CUA, member of the international dialogue (remote); 4) Fr. Hyacinthe Destivelle, Dicastery for Promoting Christian Unity, The Vatican; 5) Fr. Radu Bordeianu, Duquesne University, Pittsburgh, PA; 6) Fr Philip Halikias, World Council of Churches, Editor, Week of Prayer for Unity, Greek Orthodox. Fr. Nicolas Kazarian, Ecumenical Officer of the Greek Orthodox Archdiocese of America, will be the moderator. A question-and-answer discussion among speakers and in-person participants, with limited virtual chat-room questions, will follow each lecture.
The in-person conference will begin with dinner on Monday evening, June 17, and conclude with lunch on Thursday midday, June 20. Plenary sessions will be live streamed to virtual participants at 10:00 am, 3:00 pm, and 7:00 pm each day, EDT. Various non-eucharistic prayer services of the Byzantine tradition will be held throughout the conference.
The registration fees are the same for in-person or virtual attendees: $150.00 for 6 plenary sessions or 12 hours of lectures and discussion. Overnight accommodation is discounted to $75 per person per night until May 5th. The final deadline for registration is May 10th.
For over 25 years, the Orientale Lumen Conferences have brought together several hundred lay persons, diocesan and monastic clergy, with Church leaders, ecumenists and theologians, to learn from each other and develop ecumenical friendships. For the 10th anniversary conference, Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew said: “Your sacred intent, therefore, is blessed from within and from above by the very nature of your initiative. For, while your effort may be – as you describe it – “grass roots,” we are convinced that it is at the same time rooted in heaven.”
Visit the conference website for more information and register online: https://olfoundation.net/upcoming-events/orientale-lumen-xxviii/
Jack Figel is the founder and annual chairman of these conferences, and received the Miller Award for Excellence in Ecumenical Leadership in 2023 from the National Council of Churches.
For an introduction to the Orientale Lumen “movement” view a short video here:
https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCnVgF1Sd2Mbkl7DCTD29FuQ
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Salihiya, Lebanon | 29 March 2024
“If Christ be not raised, your faith is vain.” (I Cor. 15: 40)
Resurrection is the foundation of Christianity. Hope of resurrection is expressed in the Creed that concludes, “We look for the resurrection of the dead.”
The tomb. The icon of the Resurrection is an invitation to resurrection, as we see the risen Christ holding the hand of humans, Adam and Eve, and lifting them up from the tomb.
The symbolism is clear: as a human being, you are also called to resurrection and every Sunday of the year is a celebration of the Resurrection in our Eastern tradition. This is because the resurrection is central to Christian life, and the focus of all life.
We are exposed every day to death, physically and morally, through illness and its effects and sins of all sorts.
And today we remember the great tragedy of our brothers and sisters in Palestine – in Gaza and the West Bank, in Jerusalem and South Lebanon.
We are summoned to resist every day death and its transgressions in body and soul.
Thus, we pursue the way of a lasting, ever-new resurrection – for resurrection is new life – rising, being raised to new perspectives, hopes and love, longings for visions of kindness, rectitude and holiness.
To this resurrection you are called, and so you participate in the Resurrection of Christ – and you too, will have a resurrection.
Happy Feast, brothers and sisters, Christ is risen! He is risen indeed.
Gregorios III
Patriarch Emeritus
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In this more Byzantine-influenced part of Europe, Jan. 6 marks less the visit of the Three Kings to Baby Jesus in Bethlehem than the inauguration of Christ’s public ministry with his baptism in the Jordan River and the miracle of water turned to wine at the Wedding at Cana.
In Hungary, the feast of vízkereszt — literally “Baptism of Water” — marks the end of the Christmas season and the opening of the farsang carnival season, which in the Byzantine Catholic tradition lasts until the vespers of Cheesfare (Forgiveness) Sunday, on the eve of the start of Lent. Strongly rooted in the country’s folk culture, this commemoration is particularly popular in Hungarian villages, where, every year, faithful families sprinkle their homes with holy water from top to bottom.
Continue reading and view photos at ncregister.com.
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(OSV News) — Two Eastern Catholic bishops have issued statements with in-depth theological and canonical reasons for their rejection of a controversial Vatican document on pastoral blessings for same-sex couples and other unmarried couples.
Major Archbishop Sviatoslav Shevchuk, head of the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, and Bishop Kurt E. Burnette of the Byzantine Catholic Eparchy of Passaic, New Jersey, provided detailed responses on behalf of their respective sees to Fiducia Supplicans (“Supplicating Trust”), which was released Dec. 18 by the Vatican’s Dicastery for the Doctrine of the Faith.
The declaration, subtitled “On the pastoral meaning of blessings,” concluded that priests could offer “spontaneous” and “non-liturgical” pastoral blessings upon request to those in same-sex unions or couples in “irregular situations.” At the same time, the text — which was signed by dicastery prefect Cardinal Víctor Manuel Fernández and secretary Msgr. Armando Matteo and approved by Pope Francis — affirmed the Church’s teaching on marriage.
The declaration followed up on the pope’s response to dubia, or questions, posed by several cardinals in a letter released in early October.
“Fiducia Supplicans” garnered a range of reactions among Catholic clergy and faithful — from praise to confusion to anger — and prompted a Jan. 4 Vatican press release from Cardinal Fernández urging “a full and calm reading” of the text.
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Salhiya December 7, 2023
While watching the tragic scenes of our people in beloved Gaza, I wept repeatedly, especially at the sight of our children and infants, the darlings of their fathers and mothers, covered in rubble, blood and wounds, their cries rising to heaven as they called for help, looking for their parents and siblings.
Today, as we celebrate the birth of Jesus, the Child of the Cave, and approach the commemoration of the Children of Bethlehem, put to death by King Herod, I pray to the Child Jesus for the children caught up in this catastrophically violent, destructive and unjust war, asking Him to be born again in the houses, neighbourhoods, streets, towns and villages of beloved Gaza, bringing to all our people there, good news of peace... good news of security... good news of love... good news of hope... good news of the dawn of a new future, proclaimed by the angelic hymn on Christmas Eve near Bethlehem... so that as the angels sing, the sound of weapons, bombs, missiles, cannons and mines may fall silent.
May the Christmas hymn be sung on the fighting fronts in martyred Gaza... It is a martyr because of its martyrs and a martyr for all its inhabitants, its sons and daughters. It has become a symbol of Palestinian martyrdom, carrying the flag that has represented the Palestinian tragedy since 1947, over seventy-five years ago.
On the Afterfeast of the Nativity, (29 December) the Byzantine Eastern Church commemorates the Fourteen Thousand Holy Infants killed by King Herod in and around Bethlehem (House of Wheat). “In his exceeding wrath, Herod mowed down the infants as wheat.” (Kontakion Tone 6) This hymn describes both the ferocity and brutality of Herod and raises the infants to the level of first martyrs for Christ. Their witness means that, by being killed instead of Him, they participated in the sacrifice offered by the newborn Child Jesus.
This is the reality for the child martyrs in Gaza, whose number stands at 7,112 as of the date of this letter.
I convey to readers of these Christmas thoughts my love for these martyred children, the wounded in hospitals and the disabled... and for their honourable families... and I cite below some passages from these prayers, as an expression of the Church’s solidarity with these children, the martyrs and victims of war in Gaza, and with all the inhabitants of beloved Gaza:
“We beseech and implore thee, O Lord and Lover of mankind, to accept in supplication the suffering that thy holy children endured for thy sake, and to heal all our infirmities (and the sorrows of the children of Gaza.}
“When the King was born in Bethlehem, Herod was troubled and mowed down the children like wheat, lamenting because his power would soon pass away.
“..the lawless Herod …killed the innocent children; he made them martyrs without even realising it. They are now residents of the Kingdom on high, and they reprove his foolishness forever.
“The wicked Herod was enraged and seized the new-born infants from the arms of their mothers.…
“The choir of infants is brought forth from the blood of martyrs. Thou didst justly illumine those untroubled souls whom Thou didst lodge in the dwellings of everlasting life. They continue to reprove the wickedness and harsh foolishness of Herod.
“Your sacrifice has reached the ears of the Lord of Hosts, O honoured child martyrs, because your blood has been shed for him, and you remain in Abraham's arms forever.”
Similarly, the Church honours the child martyrs of Gaza.
How similar is the present to the past, and the past to the present! Today’s Herod has sent an army that has martyred children, women, and men, destroying the roofs over their heads... Today’s Herod is more murderous than the Herod of yesteryear. The Gaza Health Ministry announced an increase in the latest number of victims of Israeli aggression. The number of martyrs since the start of the war has reached 16,248, including 7,112 children and 4,885 women, while the number of injured has reached more than 43,000.
I raise my voice again on the Birthday of Jesus, (the Nativity) the Child of the Cave (manger), in appeal to the Arab countries, the Palestinian factions, the United States of America, the countries of the European Union, the countries of Asia and Africa and the whole world.
And I call on them to hear the cries and tears of the children of Gaza and to see with the eyes of justice and mercy the tragedies of Gaza that have surpassed historic massacres. Indeed, I call on the Jewish congregations throughout the world, on the Churches of the world and on the Islamic organizations of the whole world...
I call upon them all on the Feast of the God of Peace and the Child of the Cave to put an end to war, the logic of war, the war machines and the feelings of racism, bigotry, wickedness and hatred.
I call on them to be sons of peace and peacemakers, and my great hope is, that as we prepare to celebrate Christmas, all parties will reach a long truce, that will be a prelude to the end of the war and the communal strife and lead to the final outcome of a just, lasting and comprehensive solution to the Palestinian question, so that all the inhabitants of this Holy Land may live as Jews, Christians, Muslims, Palestinians and Israelis, in an atmosphere of peace and security, and together realise the Christmas hymn, the song of Bethlehem, the song of heaven and the song of the Holy Land, in fact, the song of peace for the whole world, east, west, south and north. Let us sing it together, and work together for it to become humanity’s constitution and the anthem of peace for all the sons and daughters of humanity.
And with the angel, and the heavenly hosts together, let us sing, “Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, goodwill among men.”
To all who receive this appeal, best wishes upon the Birthday of the Child of the Cave (the Nativity) and the God of peace, and for the beginning of the new year 2024, wishing you a good year,
Gregorios III
Melkite Greek Catholic Patriarch Emeritus
Of Antioch and All the East, of Alexandria and of Jerusalem