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2. The Holy Catholic Church, which is the Mystical Body of
Christ, is made up of the faithful who are organically united in the
Holy Spirit by the same faith, the same sacraments and the same
government and who, combining together into various groups which are
held together by a hierarchy, form separate Churches or Rites.
Between these there exists an admirable bond of union, such that the
variety within the Church in no way harms its unity; rather it
manifests it, for it is the mind of the Catholic Church that each
individual Church or Rite should retain its traditions whole and
entire and likewise that it should adapt its way of life to the
different needs of time and place.[2]
3. These individual Churches, whether of the East or the West,
although they differ somewhat among themselves in rite (to use the
current phrase), that is, in liturgy, ecclesiastical discipline,
and spiritual heritage, are, nevertheless, each as much as the
others, entrusted to the pastoral government of the Roman Pontiff,
the divinely appointed successor of St. Peter in primacy over the
universal Church. They are consequently of equal dignity, so that
none of them is superior to the others as regards rite and they enjoy
the same rights and are under the same obligations, also in respect of
preaching the Gospel to the whole world (cf. Mark 16, 15)
under the guidance of the Roman Pontiff.
4. Means should be taken therefore in every part of the world for the
protection and advancement of all the individual Churches and, to this
end, there should be established parishes and a special hierarchy where
the spiritual good of the faithful demands it. The hierarchs of the
different individual Churches with jurisdiction in one and the same
territory should, by taking common counsel in regular meetings, strive
to promote unity of action and with common endeavor to sustain common
tasks, so as better to further the good of religion and to safeguard
more effectively the ordered way of life of the clergy.[3]
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, of 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.
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