Page 2 - orientalium-ecclesiarum

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All clerics and those aspiring to sacred Orders should be instructed in the rites and especially in the practical
norms that must be applied in interritual questions. The laity, too, should be taught as part of its catechetical
education about rites and their rules.

Finally, each and every Catholic, as also the baptized of every non-Catholic church or denomination who
enters into the fullness of the Catholic communion, must retain his own rite wherever he is, must cherish it
and observe it to the best of his ability (4), without prejudice to the right in special cases of persons,
communities or areas, to have recourse to the Apostolic See, which, as the supreme judge of interchurch
relations, will, acting itself or through other authorities, meet the needs of the occasion in an ecumenical
spirit, by the issuance of opportune directives, decrees or rescripts.

PRESERVATION OF THE SPIRITUAL HERITAGE OF THE EASTERN CHURCHES

5. History, tradition and abundant ecclesiastical institutions bear outstanding witness to the great merit owing
to the Eastern Churches by the universal Church.(5) The Sacred Council, therefore, not only accords to this
ecclesiastical and spiritual heritage the high regard which is its due and rightful praise, but also
unhesitatingly looks on it as the heritage of the universal Church. For this reason it solemnly declares that
the Churches of the East, as much as those of the West, have a full right and are in duty bound to rule
themselves, each in accordance with its own established disciplines, since all these are praiseworthy by
reason of their venerable antiquity, more harmonious with the character of their faithful and more suited to
the promotion of the good of souls.

6. All members of the Eastern Rite should know and be convinced that they can and should always preserve
their legitimate liturgical rite and their established way of life, and that these may not be altered except to
obtain for themselves an organic improvement. All these, then, must be observed by the members of the
Eastern rites themselves. Besides, they should attain to an ever greater knowledge and a more exact use of
them, and, if in their regard they have fallen short owing to contingencies of times and persons, they should
take steps to return to their ancestral traditions.

Those who, by reason of their office or apostolic ministries, are in frequent communication with the Eastern
Churches or their faithful should be instructed according as their office demands in the knowledge and
veneration of the rites, discipline, doctrine, history and character of the members of the Eastern rites.(6) To
enhance the efficacy of their apostolate, Religious and associations of the Latin Rite working in Eastern
countries or among Eastern faithful are earnestly counseled to found houses or even provinces of the Eastern
rite, as far as this can be done.(7)

EASTERN RITE PATRIARCHS

7. The patriarchate, as an institution, has existed in the Church from the earliest times and was recognized by
the first ecumenical councils.(8)

By the name Eastern patriarch, is meant the bishop to whom belongs jurisdiction over all bishops, not
excepting metropolitans, clergy and people of his own territory or rite, in accordance with canon law and
without prejudice to the primacy of the Roman Pontiff.(9)

Wherever a hierarch of any rite is appointed outside the territorial bounds of the patriarchate, he remains
attached to the hierarchy of the patriarchate of that rite, in accordance with canon law.

8. Though some of the patriarchates of the Eastern Churches are of earlier and some of later date,
nonetheless all are equal in respect of patriarchal dignity, without however prejudice to the legitimately
established precedence of honor.(10)

9. By the most ancient tradition of the Church the patriarchs of the Eastern Churches are to be accorded
special honor, seeing that each is set over his patriarchate as father and head.

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