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Eastern Catholic and Eastern Orthodox

The Eastern Christian Churches

I. The Assyrian Church of the East

II. THE ORIENTAL ORTHODOX CHURCHES
A. The Armenian Apostolic Church
B. The Coptic Orthodox Church
C. The Ethiopian Orthodox Church
D. The Syrian Orthodox Church
E. The Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church
F. The Eritrean Orthodox Church

III. THE ORTHODOX CHURCH

A. The Autocephalous Churches
1. The Patriarchate of Constantinople (The Ecumenical Patriarchate)
2. The Patriarchate of Alexandria
3. The Patriarchate of Antioch
4. The Patriarchate of Jerusalem
5. The Orthodox Church of Russia
6. The Orthodox Church of Serbia
7. The Orthodox Church of Romania
8. The Orthodox Church of Bulgaria
9. The Orthodox Church of Georgia
10. The Orthodox Church of Cyprus
11. The Orthodox Church of Greece
12. The Orthodox Church of Poland
13. The Orthodox Church of Albania
14. The Orthodox Church in the Czech and Slovak Republics
15. The Holy Orthodox Catholic Patriarchate of America
16. The Orthodox Church in America

A. The Autonomous Churches
1. The Orthodox Church of Mount Sinai
2. The Orthodox Church of Finland
3. The Orthodox Church of Japan
4. The Orthodox Church of China
5. The Estonian Apostolic Orthodox Church

B. Canonical Churches Under Constantinople
1. The American Carpatho-Russian Orthodox Greek Catholic Church
2. The Ukrainian Orthodox Church of the USA and Diaspora
3. The Russian Orthodox Archdiocese in Western Europe
4. The Albanian Orthodox Diocese of America
5. The Belarusan Council of Orthodox Churches in North America
6. The Ukrainian Orthodox Church of Canada

C. Churches of Irregular Status
1. The Old Believers
2. The Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia
3. The Ukrainian Orthodox Church-Kiev Patriarchate and Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church
4. The Belarusan Autocephalous Orthodox Church
5. The Macedonian Orthodox Church
6. The Old Calendar Orthodox Churches in Greece and Romania

IV. THE CATHOLIC EASTERN CHURCHES
A. Churches with No Direct Counterpart
1. The Maronite Catholic Church
2. The Italo-Albanian Catholic Church

B. From the Assyrian Church of the East
1. The Chaldean Catholic Church
2. The Syro-Malabar Catholic Church

C. From the Oriental Orthodox Churches
1. The Armenian Catholic Church
2. The Coptic Catholic Church
3. The Ethiopian Catholic Church
4. The Syrian Catholic Church
5. The Syro-Malankara Catholic Church

D. From the Orthodox Church
1. The Melkite Catholic Church
2. The Ukrainian Catholic Church
3. The Ruthenian Catholic Church
4. The Romanian Catholic Church
5. The Greek Catholic Church
6. Byzantine Catholics in former Yugoslavia
7. The Bulgarian Catholic Church
8. The Slovak Catholic Church
9. The Hungarian Catholic Church
10. Eastern Catholic Communities Without Hierarchies

The principle used in this list is for the classification of churches is communion. That is, it lists groups of churches that are in full communion with one another or recognize the validity of each other, thus under certain circumstances one may receive the Eucharist from either listed.
This approach yields four distinct and separate Eastern Christian communions:
1) the Assyrian Church of the East;
2) the six Oriental Orthodox Churches, which, although each is fully independent, are in communion with one another;
3) the Orthodox Church, which is a communion of national or regional churches all of which recognize the Patriarch of Constantinople as a point of unity enjoying certain rights and privileges; and
4) the Eastern Catholic Churches, all of which are in communion with the Church of Rome and its bishop Pope John Paul II. The order in which these four communions are listed should not be vested with any particular significance. It reflects only the chronological sequence in which they emerged as distinct entities.

The only exception to this rule is the Orthodox Churches of Irregular Status (section III.D). They have been included as a subcategory of the Orthodox Church, but they are not in full communion with it. All of them are of Orthodox origin.