Melkite Greek Catholic Apostolic Exarchate of Venezuela (in Latin: Exarchatus Apostolicus Caracensis Graecorum Melkitarum, meaning - of Caracas) is a Melkite Greek Catholic Church missionary pre-diocesan jurisdiction or

apostolic exarchate An exarch (; from Ancient Greek ἔξαρχος ''exarchos'', meaning “leader”) was the holder of any of various historical offices, some of them being political or military and others being ecclesiastical. In the late Roman Empire and e ...

of the

Catholic Church The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...

Venezuela Venezuela (; ), officially the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela ( es, link=no, República Bolivariana de Venezuela), is a country on the northern coast of South America, consisting of a continental landmass and many islands and islets in th ...

. The apostolic exarchate is immediately exempt to the

Holy See The Holy See ( lat, Sancta Sedes, ; it, Santa Sede ), also called the See of Rome, Petrine See or Apostolic See, is the jurisdiction of the Pope in his role as the bishop of Rome. It includes the apostolic episcopal see of the Diocese of R ...

(notably the

Congregation for the Oriental Churches The Dicastery for the Eastern Churches (also called Dicastery for the Oriental Churches), previously named Congregation for the Oriental Churches or Congregation for the Eastern Churches ( la, Congregatio pro Ecclesiis Orientalibus), is a dicaste ...

) and not part of any (Melkite or

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...

)

ecclesiastical province An ecclesiastical province is one of the basic forms of jurisdiction in Christian Churches with traditional hierarchical structure, including Western Christianity and Eastern Christianity. In general, an ecclesiastical province consists of seve ...

, and encompasses the entirety of Venezuela. The exarch's

cathedral A cathedral is a church that contains the '' cathedra'' () of a bishop, thus serving as the central church of a diocese, conference, or episcopate. Churches with the function of "cathedral" are usually specific to those Christian denominatio ...

is the Cathedral of St. George, in the episcopal see and national capital city Caracas, which also has the see of the Latin metropolitan Archdiocese of Caracas, Santiago de Venezuela.

Territory and statistics

The apostolic exarchate extends to all the faithful of the Melkite Greek Catholic Church in Venezuela. The territory is divided into five parishes and had 25,000 Melkite Catholics in 2010.

History

Melkite Catholic immigration in Venezuela, especially from Aleppo in Syria, dates back to the early decades of the twentieth century and intensified in particular between the two world wars. In 1957 for the first time, a priest of the

Society of the Missionaries of St. Paul The Society of Saint Paul ( la, Societas a Sancto Paulo Apostolo) abbreviated SSP and also known as the Paulines, is a Catholic clerical religious congregation of Pontifical Right for men founded on 20 August 1914 at Alba, Piedmont in Italy by Gi ...

, Gabriel Dick, took pastoral care of the Melkite community in the country. The Apostolic Exarchate of Venezuela was erected on 19 February 1990 with the papal bull ''Quo longius''vatican.va
/ref> of

Pope John Paul II Pope John Paul II ( la, Ioannes Paulus II; it, Giovanni Paolo II; pl, Jan Paweł II; born Karol Józef Wojtyła ; 18 May 19202 April 2005) was the head of the Catholic Church and sovereign of the Vatican City State from 1978 until his ...

Incumbent ordinaries

Conforming to the Eastern tradition, ordinaries are generally monks, so far all of the Basilian Aleppian Order (B.A.) * Boutros Raï, B.A. (19 February 1990 – 7 June 1994 Died) * Georges Kahhalé Zouhaïraty, B.A. (12 October 1995 – 2019 Retired) * Joseph Antoine Khawam, B.A. (20 December 2019 – present)

References

Sources and external links

GigaCatholic, with ordinary biography links
* http://www.pgc-lb.org/fre/melkite_greek_catholic_church/Apostolic-Exarchate-of-Venezuela* {{DEFAULTSORT:Venezuela, Melkite Apostolic Exarchate Melkite Greek Catholic Church in South America Melkite Greek Catholic apostolic exarchates Eastern Catholic dioceses in Venezuela Christian organizations established in 1990 Roman Catholic dioceses and prelatures established in the 20th century 1990 establishments in Venezuela

Territory and statistics

History

Incumbent ordinaries

See also

References

Sources and external links