[jecIIny]

This would seem to imply that the only valid expression of Orthodoxy is the Byzantine Rite. Which position is at odds with the statements of more synods and saints then I am going to bother with naming. Implicitly it also means that we need to tack on one more condition for Rome to be accepted back into Orthodoxy. They need to scrap their rites and adopt the Byzantine liturgy. It might be worth noting here that Liturgy of Pope St. Gregory the Great is more ancient than that of St. John of Constantinople.

The argument that most WRO wind up going Byzantine because of a lack of a living tradition is one that I would disagree with. I think its more likely they go Byzantine because there are very few WRO parishes to support them.

Uniatism is a fair issue but its not accurately approached. In the case of the Roman Uniates they are setting up separate churches with their own episcopal hierarchies that are intended as the legitimate Eastern Churches. In the case of WRO there is no separate church being created. The concept of one city one bishop is not violated. WR parishes are all under the same bishop in the same jurisdiction as the other Orthodox Parishes (setting aside for the moment the insane situation here in North America).

"I would submit that in today's day and age, a Western Rite Orthodoxy that was the liturgical, theological, and ascetic equivalent of Eastern Orthodoxy would be every bit as foreign as is Eastern Orthodoxy. An Orthodox Christian of today transported back to, say 7th century services and Christian life in Rome, would be find it quite familiar, whereas I would wager that modern Anglicans and Roman Catholics would find it at least as foreign as their neighborhood OCA parish... "

Again I don't really agree. The pre-Vatican II rite (1962 Missal) was not enormously different from the rites that were used in the latter half of the first millennium. Compare the Rites of the corrected Sarum Missal used by ROCOR with those of the 1962 Missale Romanum or even an 8th century copy of the Roman Missal and you will find few differences. I am a little more dubious about the adoptions of the Anglican Rites, but certainly the Roman Rites are not substantially different from what they were then. A strong argument could be made that the various reforms post Vatican II constitute a break with the traditional liturgical rites of the west. But these are not reflected in WRO.

I also think you are proceeding under a false assumption that the West and the East were in complete accord on things even in the 1st millennium. They were not. There were significant differences in their spirituality and their worship from the beginning. The difference is that there was a greater tolerance for diversity with Orthodoxy in the first millennium. A tolerance that has waned over the centuries.

"Never, never, never let anyone tell you that, in order to be Orthodox, you must also be eastern. The West was Orthodox for a thousand years, and her venerable liturgy is far older than any of her heresies." St. John Maximovitch

[Kolokotronis]

"This would seem to imply that the only valid expression of Orthodoxy is the Byzantine Rite."

Its the only expression of Orthodoxy in that arena for the past 1000 years or so. The problem with the the liturgy used by this small subpart of the Antiochian Church is that, unlike the ancient liturgies of the pre and even post Schism West, this liturgy, like the Novus Ordo, is not an organic development of the liturgy, but rather something created, admittedly by a very holy fellow, to meet a real or imagined need of American converts to Orthodoxy. The Western Rite Liturgy is not the Sarum, or Gallic or Ambrosian or the Mass of +Paul V. Its a construct designed to make converts "comfortable". Since the overwhelming number of converts in this country worship at Divine Liturgies of +John Chrysostomos and seem, somehow, to become good Orthodox despite the "foreigness" of that Liturgy, one has to wonder what real value this rite has. The experience of Orthodoxy among the Slavs is particularly instructive in this regard. No "new liturgy" was created for them in recognition that Byzantine ceremonials might be "foreign" to them.

[Agrarian]

"This would seem to imply that the only valid expression of Orthodoxy is the Byzantine Rite."

At this time, it is certainly the only complete, living expression of Orthodoxy in my opinion.

This is quite different from saying that the Byzantine rite is the only *possible* liturgical expression of Orthodoxy. I have come full circle on this. When I first coming to Orthodoxy, I was very much opposed to Western rite experimentation by the Orthdox Church, primarily because of the wealth and riches of the living tradition of Eastern Orthodoxy. I then became a proponent of Western Rite Orthodoxy (in the Sarum or Gallican Rite sense). I later just got to the place where it seemed to be something destined for incompleteness, at risk of being a sort of choreography on stage, rather than a living liturgical life. I more lost interest than becoming opposed to it, and that is where I primarily am now.

As my message clearly indicated, I believe that the Western Rite can and will be recovered. But it will be done by the Patriarchate of Rome, which is currently separated from the Orthodox Church.

You are right that the pre-Vat II liturgy is not terribly distant from the Western liturgies that were in use prior to the Schism. Even the Tridentine Mass would need work in many ways to return it to fully Orthodox expression, but it would not be "major surgery." The concept of a full liturgical cycle (as opposed to reducing all liturgical activity to a single service -- the Mass) would need to be recovered (again, it's all there in the pre-Vat II daily offices, not in need of terribly major surgery to return it to what Orthodoxy would recognize as being of the same spirit and content.) There are a host of minor things, but in general you are right.

*But* I would submit to you that the average modern Roman Catholic would find even the Tridentine Mass quite foreign to them. I stand by my assessment that in general, there are not a lot of potential converts in the West whose sole or primary reason for not converting to Orthodoxy is the fact that they walk into an Orthodox parish in America and encounter a Byzantine Liturgy served in English as opposed to a Sarum Rite High Mass.

"A strong argument could be made that the various reforms post Vatican II constitute a break with the traditional liturgical rites of the west."

That argument would be a true one, and it has been made best of all by astute Catholic critics of the liturgy.

"I also think you are proceeding under a false assumption that the West and the East were in complete accord on things even in the 1st millennium. They were not. There were significant differences in their spirituality and their worship from the beginning."

No, I am not, actually, although I can see that it would seem that way. There are a couple of thoughts on this that I have, though. The first is that you are exactly right to point out that the West had not only its own liturgical tradition but also a spiritual tradition closely linked with it. During the centuries in which the Schism developed, that seamless whole of liturgy, theology, and spirituality (with which the East was in basic unity) was gradually broken and distorted, and all three began to change in ways that made them not just different from Eastern expressions and traditions, but actually foreign to Orthodoxy.

The wholeness of the Byzantine Orthodox tradition is theological, liturgical, and spiritual/ascetic -- and that tradition is unbroken. The outward Western liturgical expression would be the easiest thing to recover for a potential WRO. Also, the theological unity is pretty easy -- it was always the point at which there was the least difference between East and West. The unifying spiritual tradition that must be the "glue" that holds theology, liturgy, and general Christian praxis together will be the hardest thing to recover.

Don't get me wrong. I have no actual objections to those who want to try to create Western liturgical expressions, and I certainly want to connect as deeply as possible with the Western spiritual writings and saints as I can. I bear the name of a pre-Schism western saint, and have several of their icons. I completely agree with St. John of SF -- I most certainly have not become Eastern, as the cowboy boots that I wear nearly every day will attest! :-)

I wish all Western Rite proponents well, but I am pessimistic about how successful they will be. There is nothing heretical in the Antiochian Anglican-based liturgy, but next to the fullness of the Byzantine Rite, it seems to be quite thin. Perhaps it will grow and become thick and rich :-) -- but I am so comfortable in the Byzantine Rite (as I know you also are), that I really don't feel compelled to encourage it or play any role in it. I personally don't think that things like the Sarum or Gallican Rite would do much better, at least here in the U.S. But I would love to be proven wrong.