Joseph Azize
What is the Maronite Catholic faith? It is a Church which professes the same creed as the Universal Catholic Church. It is an expression of the revelation and sacramental dispensation of Our Lord Jesus Christ, addressed to a people who shared the Aramaic language and culture of the Semitic world into which He Himself was born. If we think of it as a tree, then its seed was planted by the teaching of Our Lord Jesus Christ, as passed on through His apostles. In the person of St Maroun of Syria, that seed put down roots. Then, through his disciples, who journeyed to Lebanon, a sapling shot up from the soil of Lebanon. Finally, a full-grown cedar appeared, tended by St Yuhanna Maroun (a monk from a Syrian monastery named after St Maroun), who was elected Patriarch of Antioch to preserve the Christian faith. -- From the Introduction
