Latin Church

To be settled.

I'm confident that all usage of Catholic Church is unambiguous, so that all current mentioning of Roman Catholic Church in Wikipedia may be changed to Catholic Church (or changed to Latin Church if Roman Catholic Church is wrongly used to mean Latin Church). But I can imagine that there is some hesitance when "Catholic" is used as an adjective but not in conjunction with Church. For example I would strongly prefer "Theology of the Catholic Church" as an article title over Catholic theology, considering that independent Catholic churches and Anglo-Catholic churches may well have some differences in theology. But on the other hand the usage of "Roman" would not really solve this, it would merely add more confusion because it is not clear whether it refers to the Catholic Church (probably) or only the Latin Church (possibly). But where should I leave this comment, other than here? Marcocapelle (talk) 18:07, 13 August 2018 (UTC)

Thanks for your comments Marcocapelle. I guess this is exactly a place for this discussion. A central location, finally. Being an expert on consistency matters on Wikipedia especielly in categories, it's great to have you here. I woud mostly concur with your reasoning. Would you mind editing the very naming proposal page accordingly, please? As for the specific discussion about the name of the Latin Church, and by consequence its adjective, including for dioceses, I suppose the Latin Church#Name should be the main point of reference for that. And currently, that main point of reference could use some labor, couldn't it? Chicbyaccident (talk) 18:29, 13 August 2018 (UTC)

There is no reason for me to edit the proposal, as I concur with the text of Wikipedia:Proposed_naming_conventions_(Catholic_Church)#Catholicism. I just want to emphasize what I have written above because presumably these aspects have not been considered well enough in the previous discussion that led to the rejection of the proposal. Marcocapelle (talk) 05:20, 14 August 2018 (UTC)

So, have you any ideas on how to get these aspects... considered well enough to avoid another rejection? I'm not promising to support it, but I'm interested in hearing your arguments as to why it should be reconsidered and accepted.

But you do raise an interesting point that neither my draft nor the rejected proposal deals with adequately in my opinion. According to our current articles both the Latin Church and the Catholic Church are sometimes referred to as the Roman Catholic Church, so the term is ambiguous. That'a another reason to avoid it, surely? (I think many probably also say Catholic Church when they mean Latin Church, but maybe that's getting needlessly complicated.) Andrewa (talk) 05:53, 16 August 2018 (UTC)

Yes, agree. Marcocapelle (talk) 07:16, 18 August 2018 (UTC)

I am following your arguments. Perhaps we would need an RfC for this question. I have helped populating Category:Latin Church with the intention to bring about hopefully a better overview of the preexisting state for this issue. Chicbyaccident (talk) 11:02, 18 August 2018 (UTC)

"Roman Catholic" is widely used in Wikipedia and outside of Wikipedia to refer to the Latin/Roman-rite/Western part of the Church. I believe that the term "Roman Catholic" should not be replaced by just "Catholic" when it is used in articles or categories in the specific sense of Latin/Western Catholicism, as opposed to Eastern Catholic topics. When the term "Roman Catholic" is used to mean "Catholic" at large, I have no objection for the term to be replaced, following consensus on the Catholic Church talk page.

Examples of a few uses of the term Roman Catholic in Wikipedia and in external references:

• Eastern Catholic Churches § Terminology

Some Eastern Catholics who use the Byzantine liturgical rite and call themselves "Byzantine Catholics" deny that they are "Roman Catholics", using this word to mean either Catholics who use the Roman Rite or perhaps the whole Latin Church, including those parts that use the Ambrosian Rite or other non-Roman liturgical rites: "We're Byzantine rite, which is Catholic, but not Roman Catholic".

• Eastern Catholic Churches § Organisation

Individual eparchies of some Eastern Catholic churches may be suffragan to Latin-rite metropolitans. For example, the Croatian Catholic Eparchy of Križevci is suffragan to the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Zagreb.^[1] Also, some minor Eastern Catholic churches have Latin prelates. For example, the Macedonian Byzantine-Catholic Church is organized as a single Apostolic Exarchate, whose present ordinary is the Roman Catholic bishop of Skopje.^[2]

• Roman Catholic (term) § "Roman Catholic" and "Western or Latin Catholic"

Some do use the term "Roman Catholic" to refer to Western (i.e. Latin) Catholics, excluding Eastern Catholics. An example is the statement in the book When other Christians become Catholic: "...the individual becomes Eastern Catholic, not Roman Catholic."^[3] Similarly the Catholic Faith Handbook for Youth states that "...not all Catholics are Roman Catholics and there are other Catholic Churches," using the term "Roman Catholic" to refer to Western Church members alone.^[4] The same distinction is made by some writers belonging to Eastern Catholic Churches.^[5][6][7]

• Roman Catholic (term) § "Roman Catholic" and "Roman Rite Catholic"

We use the term Roman Catholic Worship throughout to make it clear that we are not covering all forms of Catholic worship. There are a number of Eastern Rite churches that can justly claim the title Catholic, but many of the statements we make do not apply to them at all.

— Roman Catholic Worship: Trent to today^[8]

Some of the writers who draw a contrast between "Roman Catholics" and "Eastern Catholics" may perhaps be distinguishing Eastern Catholics not from Latin or Western Catholics in general, but only from those (the majority of Latin Catholics) who use the Roman liturgical rite. Adrian Fortescue explicitly made this distinction, saying that, just as "Armenian Catholic" is used to mean a Catholic who uses the Armenian rite, "Roman Catholic" could be used to mean a Catholic who uses the Roman Rite.^[9]

• Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church § Reorganization and establishment of Greek Catholic Church under the Habsburg Monarchy

The territory received by Austria-Hungary in the partition of Poland included Galicia (modern western Ukraine and southern Poland). Here the Greek-Catholic Ruthenian (Ukrainian) peasantry had been largely under Polish Roman Catholic domination. The Austrians granted equal freedom of worship to the Greek-Catholic Church and removed Polish influence. [...]^[10]

• Latin Church § Name

The term of "Roman Catholic Church" is sometimes also used to refer to the Latin Church, for instance when used by Eastern Catholics,^[11], but can also be used for the Catholic Church as a whole in some context, such as non-Catholic contexts.

Therefore, this use of the term Roman Catholic is quite prevalent and should be respected. Replacing it blindly by Catholic brings more ambiguity, not less. Place Clichy (talk) 17:57, 29 August 2018 (UTC)

@Place Clichy: Thanks for making the efforts with explaining your thoughts above. I'm inclined to largely agree with many of the points. However, I am still hesitant to support raison d'être of distinguishing Latin Church-pertainance in all entries (and/or categories). Yet, I think your arguments merit more more evaluation than just mine and the few other's here. Would you mind making it an RfC right here on this talk page? Chicbyaccident (talk) 14:27, 16 September 2018 (UTC)

@Place Clichy, Chicbyaccident, Marcocapelle, Andrewa, and Vaquero100: “Latin Church” should refer to the particular church. There is an issue of where “Roman Catholic Church” should go. “Roman Catholic Church”should only redirect to “Latin Church” because of rites(capital ‘R’ for particular churches;lowercase ‘r’ for liturgies). To clarify, “Latin Church” is associated with Latin liturgical rites. As such, “Latin Church” redirection seems appropriate. Latin liturgical rites are an umbrella term for various Rites. This is unpopular but the bigger question is to avoid confusion.

“Roman Catholic” vs. “Roman Rite Catholic”: “Roman Catholic” refers adjectively to a Catholic person in Rome. While the latter is more specific, nowadays “Roman Catholic” is not used in this context and people may just say Italian Catholic. This is a debate over influence- Wikipedia may be able to change people’s minds and thus teach them the key nuances of terms. I agree that “Roman Catholic” could stay the same in current articles, BUT a gradual change in articles from “Roman Catholic” to “Latin Catholic”.

This means if there is a consensus editors won’t start changing article immediately because that will shock viewers. “Roman Catholic Church” should be redirected to the disambiguation page because “Roman Catholic Church” can either mean the “Church in Rome” or “Roman[Rite]Catholic Church”. In others words for sure, “Roman Rite Catholic Church” should redirect to “Latin Church”. Name corrections can happen but it should be done over a span of 5 years or more.

External sources are another point of contention that being “Roman Catholic Church” could mean either “Latin Church” or the Church as a whole. Eastern Christians would view “Roman Catholic” as the “Latin Church” and rightfully so. However non-Catholics/outsiders would be an ambiguous source on what is referred to. Wikipedians should use context and assume point of view. That is to each source make your best judgement call to whether the church as a whole or the “Latin Church”. Now back to gradual change. This is a general observation: Do not mothers wean their children? Criticism is most welcome.Manabimasu (talk) 06:06, 26 April 2019 (UTC)

Eastern Catholic Churches

To be settled.

Dioceses of the Latin Church

To be settled.

• For relevant recent discussions (15 August 2018), see:
  • Category talk:Roman Catholic dioceses in Europe
  • Wikipedia:Categories_for_discussion/Log/2018_August_15#Category:Converts_to_Roman_Catholicism_from_Evangelicalism

Dioceses of the Eastern Catholic Churches

To be settled.