American Orthodox Catholic Church - Western Rite Mission, Diocese of New York

Infobox Christian denomination
name = American Orthodox Catholic Church - Western Rite Mission, Diocese of New York


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founder = Joseph J. Raffaele
founded_date = December, 1976
founded_place = Suffolk County, New York
separated_from = Mount Athos Synod
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area = New York and Florida
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The American Orthodox Catholic Church - Western Rite Mission, Diocese of New York is a small Christian denomination based in New York.

It was founded by Joseph Raffaele in December, 1976, when he separated the church from the Mount Athos Synod.

The church is in the Old Catholic tradition, It accepts the "Baltimore Catechism", without its references to the papacy, as an authority regarding doctrinal matters, and uses the 1917 Code of Canon Law. It does not require clerical celibacy, but does prohibit the ordination of women. It does not take any collections during its services, and its communion services are open to all.

In 1979, it established a mission church in Yonkers, New York, St. Matthias' Church. That same year the church's base parish, St. Gregory's Church, relocated to a building it had just purchased in Medford, New York.

It has a religious order, the Congregataion of the Religious of the Society of St. Gregory the Great, which provides the churches priests and religious with a monastic rule. It also has a third order which is a lay religious order for deaconesses. It publishes the periodical "Glad Tidings" from its headquarters in Medford.

It reports two bishop-priests and five priests, serving its churches in New York, and another Spanish language parish in Miami, Florida.

External link

* [http://www.aoccw.org/about/index.htm American Orthodox Catholic Church - Western Rite]

References

Melton, J. Gordon. "The Encyclopedia of American Religions", 2nd ed. Detroit:Gale Research Company, 1987. ISBN 0-8103-2133-5.