To begin the Lenten season, many parishes of the Byzantine Rite on Forgiveness Sunday will celebrate a service called Forgiveness Vespers, which concludes with the Ceremony of Mutual Forgiveness.
With Forgiveness Vespers, Byzantine Rite Catholics ‘prepare for the preparation’: the Great Lent
New bishop named for U.S. Syro-Malabar Catholic Diocese in Chicago
The Syro-Malabar Catholic Church is one of two Eastern Catholic churches that have their origins in India. The other is the Syro-Malankara Catholic Church.
Eastern Catholic leaders meet to discuss importance of liturgical identity
Eastern Catholic churches must strengthen their liturgical identity, especially given ongoing conflicts in many of the homelands of those churches and the continuing migration of Eastern Catholics to countries where most Catholics belong to the Latin rite.
Looking East: Book on celibacy barely acknowledges Eastern tradition
In his 38-page essay in the book, retired Pope Benedict did not mention specifically the practice of ordaining married men to the priesthood in the Christian East.
Have courage, pray fervently, pope tells churches facing persecution
During a special Mass of thanksgiving Oct. 12 marked the 100th anniversary of the establishment of the Congregation for Eastern Churches, Pope Francis stated no matter how much suffering Christians face in the world, God never forgets those who trust in and serve him.
Changing canon law, pope brings Latin and Eastern practices closer
Bishop Juan Ignacio Arrieta, secretary of the Pontifical Council for Legislative Texts, spoke to journalists Sept. 15 after the publication of an apostolic letter published “motu proprio” (on his own initiative) in which Pope Francis ordered the changes to the Latin Code of Canon Law, the 1983 text governing the majority of the world’s Catholics.