OUR ITALIAN GREEK CATHOLICS 115 



At Bari, in Apulia, there is the Greek Catholic Church of 

 San Nicolo di Mira, where the body of St. Nicholas of Myra — 

 the great saint of the Greek Church — is entombed. It was 

 brought from Lycia by the Crusaders ; and Greeks from Italy, 

 Greece, Russia, Austria, Rumania, Turkey and Asia Minor 

 come here every year to venerate his shrine. 



In Sicily there are 20 Greek-Catholic churches, chiefly in the 

 Dioceses of Monreale and Palermo.^ The Church of San 

 Nicolo dei Greci, in Palermo, has a fine iconostasis, and is the 

 church of the Greek seminary. The Church of San Demetrio, 

 in Piana dei Greci, has been declared a "National Monument." 

 There are also Italian Greek Catholic churches in Naples, Va- 

 letta in Malta, Chieti and Villa Badessa in the Abruzzi, Leg- 

 horn, and in Cargese in Corsica. There are also Greek Catho- 

 lics in Venice, Ancona, Florence and Ravenna. In Venice and 

 Ancona, t4ie Greek churches, which were formerly Greek Cath- 

 olic, are now Greek Orthodox, having turned schismatic. The 

 Greek Church of San Giorgio, in Venice, is a very handsome 

 edifice. In Naples, the Greek Orthodox have, after a long Hti- 

 gation, commencing in 1871, also won the finest and largest 

 Greek church, leaving the smaller one to the Greek Catholics. 



The Greek Catholic clergy in Italy are under three bishops, 

 none of whom has diocesan jurisdiction, being only titular 

 bishops of Oriental dioceses, but who have jurisdiction in mat- 

 ters pertaining to the Greek rite, and who ordain all the Greek 

 clergy, and in most cases give the sacrament of confirmation. 

 In Italy, the Greek Catholic priests do not confer the sacra- 

 ment of confirmation, as is usual elsewhere in the Greek rite.^ 



I have not been able to ascertain the number of monks at 

 the Basilian monastery of Grotta Ferrata. The number of 

 Greek Catholic priests in Sicily is 50, and in Calabria and 

 Southern Italy about 60; while the number of Greek clergy at 

 Rome (including intended missionaries and monks of Basil) 

 is probably about 50. Besides these, there are from one to two 

 Greek priests at each of the churches in the other parts of 

 Italy and the islands of Malta and Corsica. 



The priests are either an Arciprete, that is a rector of the 



Montalbano, Casalnuovo: in Apulia, Contessa, Entellina, Piano dei Greci, 



Lecce, Taranto, Otranto, Bari, Nardo, and Messina, Girgenti, besides some 



Bau, Galatino, Barletta and in many of country districts and small places, 



the surrounding villages. * Constitutio Benedicti XIV, "Etsi 



^ The Greek churches in Sicily are pastoralis," June i, 1742, III, 4. 

 at Palermo, Mezzojuso, Palazzo Adriano, 



