Roman Catholic Church

The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest organizational body of Christians. Its membership is over one billion. 1,085,557,000 is the figure, rounded to the nearest thousand, given in the 2003 Statistical Yearbook of the Church, page 43. Because of obstacles to regular contacts, this figure does not include Roman Catholics in mainland China and perhaps in some other places. According to canon law, members are those who have been baptized in the Catholic Church or have been received into the Catholic Church after being baptized elsewhere, and who have not formally defected.

Particular Churches within the single Catholic Church

Unlike "families" or "communions" of Churches that see themselves as distinct Churches, the Church of those who are in full communion with the Pope considers itself a single Church, not a federation of Churches. It has authoritatively expressed this self-understanding in, for instance, the 28 May 1992 Letter to the Bishops of the Catholic Church on some aspects of the Church understood as communion, 9.http://www.vatican.va/roman_curia/congregations/cfaith/documents/rc_con_cfaith_doc_28051992_communionis-notio_en.html

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Accordingly, it has never adopted the usage of those who apply the term "Roman Catholic" to the Latin-Rite or Western Church alone, to the exclusion of the Eastern Churches that also are in full communion with the Bishop of Rome. When it employs the term "Roman Catholic Church", which it rarely does except in its relations with other Churches, it means the whole Church "governed by the successor of Peter and by the bishops in communion with him", wherever they live and whether they are of Eastern or Western tradition, the whole Church that has as its central point of reference Rome, whose Bishop the Church sees as the successor of Saint Peter. The only other meaning it would give to "Roman Catholic" is "a Catholic who lives in Rome", as a Catholic who lives in Warsaw could be called a Warsaw Catholic.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

On the other hand, the Roman Catholic Church attaches great importance to the particular Churches within it, whose theological significance the Second Vatican Council highlighted. Two categories of particular Churches are distinguished.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Particular Churches or rites

The higher level of particular Churches is that of what the Second Vatican Council’s Decree on the Catholic Eastern Churches Orientalium Ecclesiarum, 2http://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_decree_19641121_orientalium-ecclesiarum_en.html calls "particular Churches or rites". The long-established use of the term "rite" for these particular Churches is due to the central place that the Eucharist holds in the Roman Catholic Church, making each particular Church's liturgy its most noted distinguishing mark.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

However, the word "rite" is used not only of particular Churches but also of liturgical rites. While the Eastern Orthodox Churches have, with scarcely any variation except for language, a single uniform liturgical rite, known, because of the city where it originated, as the Byzantine rite, the Catholic Church uses a great variety of liturgical rites. Within the Latin-Rite Church there exist or have existed the following liturgical rites:

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:1. The Roman rite (those who claim that the liturgical reforms introduced since the Second Vatican Council marked a complete break rather than a further development like those that occurred in the Roman liturgical rite during the first millennium and a half of its existence see as two distinct rites the form that the Roman rite had from the Council of Trent to the Second Vatican Council (see Tridentine Mass) and its present form (which they refer to as the "Novus Ordo Missae").

Related Topics:
Tridentine Mass - Novus Ordo Missae

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:2. The Ambrosian rite celebrated throughout the Archdiocese of Milan, Italy.

Related Topics:
Ambrosian rite - Milan, Italy

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:3. The Mozarabic rite celebrated in the cathedral of Toledo, Spain.

Related Topics:
Mozarabic rite - Toledo, Spain

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:4. The Braga rite once celebrated in Portugal.

Related Topics:
Braga rite - Portugal

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:5. The rites of religious orders such as Dominicans, Carthusians, and Carmelites.

Related Topics:
Dominicans - Carthusians - Carmelites

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:6. The Sarum Rite and the York Use of the dioceses of Salisbury and York in Pre-Reformation England.

Related Topics:
Sarum Rite - York Use - Reformation - England

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:7. The Celtic rites of Ireland and northern Britain, replaced by the Roman rite in the Middle Ages.

Related Topics:
Celtic rites - Ireland - Britain

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:8. The Gallican rite that, even after the Council of Trent, enjoyed currency in France in the period before the French Revolution and for some time after. The Lyonnais Rite of Lyon, France is a relic of this rite.

Related Topics:
Gallican rite - Council of Trent - France - French Revolution - Lyonnais Rite - Lyon, France

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:9. The Trondheim rite used in pre-Reformation Norway.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:10. The African rite (of which practically no details are known) used in North Africa prior to the Arab conquest.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

None of the still surviving liturgical rites in this list is a "particular Church or rite" in the sense considered here. A "particular Church or rite" does not necessarily use a distinct liturgical rite: many Eastern Catholic Churches all use the same Byzantine liturgical rite. And an individual "particular Church or rite" may use several distinct liturgical rites: the Latin-Rite Church uses several liturgical rites, even apart from the alleged distinction between a "Tridentine" and a "Second Vatican Council" rite.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Not only the term "rite", but also, as we shall soon see, the term "particular Church" can be understood in more than one way. Since a legal text must be careful to avoid ambiguities, the 1983 Code of Canon Law adopted instead the term "autonomous ritual Church" (in Latin, "Ecclesia ritualis sui iuris") for the reality that the Second Vatican Council called a "particular Church or rite"; and the 1990 Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches shortened this to "autonomous Church" (in Latin, "Ecclesia sui iuris").

Related Topics:
1983 - 1990

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

The autonomy of each such Church, Eastern or Western, shows in its distinctive liturgy, canon law, theological tradition, etc. The Latin or Western particular Church is governed by the Code of Canon Law, while the Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches outlines the discipline that the Eastern particular Churches have in common.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

The official yearly Vatican directory, Annuario Pontificio (Libreria Editrice Vaticana), gives the following list of rites (in the sense of particular Churches, not of liturgical rites) within the Roman Catholic Church:

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:A. Eastern rites of Alexandrian tradition: Coptic, Ethiopic (2).

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:B. Eastern rites of Antiochian tradition: Malankara, Maronite, Syrian (3).

Related Topics:
Malankara - Maronite - Syrian

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:C. Eastern rite of Armenian tradition: Armenian Church (1).

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:D. Eastern rites of Chaldaean or East-Syrian tradition: Chaldean, Malabar (2).

Related Topics:
Chaldean - Malabar

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:E. Eastern rites of Constantinopolitan or Byzantine tradition: Albanian, Belarusian, Bulgarian, Greek, Greek-Melkite, Hungarian, Italo-Albanian, Romanian, Russian, Ruthenian, Slovak, Ukrainian (12).

Related Topics:
Albanian - Romanian - Ruthenian - Ukrainian

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

:F. Latin rite (1).

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Particular or local Churches

In Catholic teaching, each diocese too is a local or particular Church: "A diocese is a section of the People of God entrusted to a bishop to be guided by him with the assistance of his clergy so that, loyal to its pastor and formed by him into one community in the Holy Spirit through the Gospel and the Eucharist, it constitutes one particular church in which the one, holy, catholic and apostolic Church of Christ is truly present and active" (Second Vatican Council, Decree on the Pastoral Office of Bishops in the Church Christus Dominus, 11http://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_decree_19651028_christus-dominus_en.html).

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Theological significance

The particular Churches within the Catholic Church, whether rites or dioceses, are seen as not simply branches or sections of a larger body. Theologically, each is considered to be the embodiment in a particular place of the whole Roman Catholic Church. "It is in these and formed out of them that the one and unique Catholic Church exists" (Second Vatican Council, Dogmatic Decree on the Church Lumen Gentium, 23.http://www.vatican.va/archive/hist_councils/ii_vatican_council/documents/vat-ii_const_19641121_lumen-gentium_en.html).

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~