Eastern Rite Church Liturgy

As a Roman Catholic belonging to the Latin Rite, I should say that before this project I was unfamiliar with the Eastern Rite Church Liturgy, nor had I ever heard about a Melkite Greek Catholic Church following the Rite of St. John Chrysostom. However, little did I knew that Catholics are welcome to attend to their services and participate fully in the holy communion and thus fulfill their obligation to attend Mass as they are accustomed in any Catholic Church. Knowing this, I found it interesting to learn more about their rites, spirituality and how they represent as a community their Catholicism through the Eastern Rite.

The Eastern Rite Divine Liturgy service follows a very similar synthesis as that of a Latin Rite service. The ritual consisted

It must be first noted that the communities share a similar doctrine, for example the believing in the Holy Spirit. Also, the same must be said of the liturgy and the sacraments. The Eastern Rite includes chants, sermon and a specific worship style that makes seeks to make a union with the community and God. The beauty of the worship changed my whole concept of the liturgy not seen just as a simple ritual to perform a religious practice. We are all connected in one way or another to a ritual. Many ritual gestures were very familiar since they share the same communion with the Catholic Church. The community showed great devotion to the sacred by kissing the icons as a sign of worship, using the incense and at the time of reading the Gospel some worshippers come forward and stand under the Gospel Book to show devotion. Overall, the Divine Liturgy was very interesting. The most interesting part of the ritual was the receiving of the Body and Blood of Christ, coming forward with hands crossed over the chest and the priest administering the communion in the mouth. The action of the metany, bowing down and making the sign of the cross seemed to be a very particular ritual of the Eastern Church. These metanies are expressed constantly through the celebration of the ritual to show reverence to God. I learned that the community is very welcoming and at the same time very involve in the life of the Church. I would say that their common goal is to be a united community that seeks holiness through the participation in the sacramental life of their