BOOK NOTE: Text on Eastern canon law published (05/15/94)

BOOK NOTE

Text on Eastern canon law published

BROOKLYN, N.Y. - Archimandrite Victor J. Pospishil has authored "Eastern Catholic Church Law According to the Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches."

For the past four decades, Archimandrite Pospishil has published Eastern canon law for use by priests, religious and laity of the Eastern Churches, as well as for those of the Latin Church. This book is adapted to the needs of the pastoral clergy, candidates to the priesthood, the religious and the educated laity. Attention is paid to the differences between the Eastern Catholic (CCEO) and the Latin (CIC) canon law and reference is made to the Eastern non-Catholic (Orthodox) law.

The Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches received legal force on October 1, 1991. The presentation in this book on Eastern canon law is restricted to those parts of the code that are of more practical value for those who will use the book as an introduction and source of practical information. Areas such as the canons on the autonomous Eastern Churches, on the patriarchates, the dioceses and parishes, bishops and pastors, on marriage law and some others, have received full treatment; others, such as the law of judicial procedure, have been presented in a condensed but adequate form.

Msgr. Pospishil offers a succinct but complete account of all 21 Eastern Catholic Churches and their ecclesial character as Churches of their own, and has added a description of the non- Catholic Churches in the world and their ecclesial peculiarities. The introduction offers guidance for the sources of those who wish to widen their studies of Eastern canon law, schools of canon law, some of the pertinent periodicals, collections of legal documents, associations which promote Eastern canon law, etc.

The peculiar legal status of Eastern Christianity in the nations of the Near East, where the Islamic majority has assigned to the various Churches the task of administering familial law also in the civil legal forum, has been noted in this book.

According to the text, there are now 20 Eastern Catholic bishops of dioceses and exarchies of eight different autonomous Churches in the United States and in Canada. In addition there are other Eastern Catholics as yet without bishops of their own, sometimes gathered in parishes of their own under the local Latin ordinaries, while other Eastern families and individuals of all 21 Eastern Catholic Churches are entrusted to the care of local Latin pastors. They remain, however, under the exclusive authority of their own CCEO.

At present there are 190 Eastern Catholic ordinaries on all continents: patriarchs, major archbishops, metropolitans, bishops, apostolic exarchs, apostolic administrators, archimandrites and simple hierarchs. The Eastern Catholic Churches continue to grow even in difficult circumstances. The Syro-Malabar Church of India recently was elevated to a quasi-patriarchal major archiepiscopate, the second alongside the Ukrainian major archiepiscopate, now resurrected from the catacombs after 40 years of atheistic Russian Communist suppression and which has just erected four additional dioceses in Ukraine.

Differences between the Eastern and Western traditions, such as those which refer to baptism, confirmation, holy orders, married priests, the synodal structure of patriarchates and archiepiscopates, election of bishops by the synod of bishops of each Church, etc., are duly treated and preceded by brief historical introductions.

The thorny question of the Eastern Catholic Churches, the majority of whose members have now settled outside the historical territory of their respective Churches and thereby been placed under the immediate jurisdiction of the pope with little authority left to their patriarchs, is also treated by the author.

Each of the 57 chapters in this 704-page book is introduced for easy reference with a brief schematic overview of the contents. A table of contents and an alphabetical index with 1,600 entries facilitates the reader's search for topics of interest.

The book may be ordered from: St. Maron Publications, P.O. Box 280036, Brooklyn, NY 11222-0002; telephone, (718) 259-9200; fax, (718) 259-8968. Price: hardbound, $46.95; softbound, $36.95. Add $5 for postage and handling. (There is no charge for postage and handling for prepaid orders.)

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