Western Rite Orthodoxy
Some congregations use what has become known simply as the English Liturgy, which is derived from the Anglican Book of Common Prayer,[1] albeit with some Byzantinization intended to emphasize Eastern Orthodox theological teaching.
[7][8] From 1864, Julian Joseph Overbeck, a former Roman Catholic priest, worked to establish a modern Orthodox Western Rite.
Three years later, Joachim III and the Synod of the Ecumenical Patriarchate conditionally approved Overbeck's Western rite and Benedictine offices.
"[13] Some speculate Bishop Mathew's 1909 Old Catholic Missal and Ritual may have been approved as a Western Rite liturgy by Pope Photios of Alexandria.
Though the union was protested by the Archbishop of Canterbury to Photios and the Patriarch of Antioch, Mathew's group claimed that communion was never formally broken off.
[15] In 1890, the first Western Rite Orthodox community in North America, an Episcopal parish in Green Bay, Wisconsin, pastored by Fr.
Western rite parishes were established in Poland in 1926 when a half-dozen congregations were received into Eastern Orthodoxy; however, the movement dwindled during World War II.
[16] In 1936, the ROC received a small group led by a former Liberal Catholic bishop, Louis-Charles Winnaert (1880–1937), as the Église Orthodoxe Occidentale (EOO).
Winnaert's work was continued, with occasional conflict, by one of his priests, Eugraph Kovalevsky (1905–1970) and Lucien Chambault, the latter of which oversaw a small Orthodox Benedictine community in Paris.
Eventually, Alexis was consecrated as an ROC bishop in 1960, continuing his Western Rite work under the auspices of the Moscow Patriarchate.
[18] While the Russian Orthodox Church's[clarify] Western Rite mission withered and ended, ECOF thrived; however, after Maximovich died, Kovalevsky was left without canonical protection until his death in 1970.
While he was bishop of the ROC's diocese in America, some Episcopalians were interested in joining Orthodoxy while retaining Anglican liturgical practices.
With the collapse of that plan and the submission of the ethnic groups to the churches of their homelands, the Society was left in isolation.Through Father Paul Schneirla, he began unofficial dialogue with Metropolitan Antony Bashir.
Upon reception, Bishop Alexander Turner became a canonical priest of the Antiochian Orthodox Church, guiding the group as Vicar-General until his death in 1971, thereafter he was succeeded by Schneirla.
However, after Turner's death, the sole surviving Basilian, William Francis Forbes, returned to the American Orthodox Catholic Church and was consecrated a bishop in October 1974.
[24] Besides the original communities associated with the Society, a number of other parishes have been received into the Western Rite Vicariate of the Antiochian Archdiocese, particularly as elements within the Episcopal Church became dissatisfied with liturgical change and the ordination of women.
The Synod of Bishops of ROCOR, presided over by its First Hierarch, decreed that:[26] The Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia established a working commission to deal with the peculiarities that led to decision of July 2013.
[40]: 278 Meyendorff, Schmemann, and Schneirla were already familiar with the Western Rite both from having been in contact with members of the ECOF while teaching at Saint Sergius Theological Institute.
Schmemann actively followed the Liturgical Movement in the Roman Catholic and Anglican Church and was an advocate for renewal of the Orthodox liturgy.
[47] Also in common use within the AWRV, though not officially approved, are St. Dunstan's Plainsong Psalter,[48] The English Office Noted,[49] and the St. Ambrose Hymnal.
"[51] There are also devotional societies within the AWRV: Parishes and missions belonging to the Western Rite can be found in a number of Orthodox jurisdictions.
Metropolitan Kallistos Ware considered Western Rite Orthodoxy inherently divisive, believing that following different liturgical traditions from their neighboring Byzantine Rite Eastern Orthodox Christians meant they did not share liturgical unity with them and presented an unfamiliar face to the majority of Eastern Orthodox Christians.
