the conferences; but their foundation again shows the Pope's zeal for the Christian East. It was also during his Pontificate that a number of journals and reviews were founded by Catholics, under his auspices, for the study of Eastern Christendom.[1]
On November 30, 1894, Leo XIII published his famous Constitution Orientalium Dignitas,[2] which takes a place second only to those of Benedict XIV.
In this he enforces even more strongly the old principles of the Holy See; that Latins are in no way to disparage Eastern rites, nor to try to persuade Eastern Christians to become Latins. He begins by explaining again that the ancient Eastern rites are a witness to the Apostolicity of the Catholic Church, that their diversity, consistent with unity of the faith, is itself a witness to the unity of the Church, that they add to her dignity and honour. He says that the Catholic Church does not possess one rite only, but that she embraces all the ancient rites of Christendom; her unity consists not in a mechanical uniformity of all her parts, but on the contrary, in their variety, according in one principle and vivified by it.
So he continues: "It is therefore more than ever the duty of our office to watch strictly that no injury be done to them (Eastern rites) by the imprudence of ministers of the Gospel from Western lands, whom zeal for the teaching of Christ sends towards Eastern nations." He repeats the statement of Benedict XIV, that Western missionaries are sent to the East only to be helpers and supports to the Eastern Catholic Patriarchs and bishops, not in any way to prejudice the rights of Eastern Churches. He sanctions this principle by a penalty: "Any Latin missionary, whether regular or secular, who by his advice or influence shall have persuaded an Eastern Christian to adopt the Latin rite, shall incur ipso facto suspension a diuinis and all other pains threatened in the Constitution Demandatam."[3]
In order to give greater force to this penalty the Pope orders that it shall be put up publicly in the sacristy of all Latin Churches in the East. It may still be seen there. I have found it in sacristies of Latin Churches in the Levant. When I went to say Mass the first time in the Latin church at
