Melwin Thurackal Jaison: "India still needs priests and religious willing to sacrifice".The Pope has reshuffled the leadership of the Syro-Malabar Church of India in the state of Kerala, accepting the resignation of the major archbishop, Cardinal George Alencherry, and of Msgr. Andrew Thazhath, the apostolic administrator he appointed two years ago for the "rebel" archdiocese of Ernakulam-Angamaly. A measure adopted after the vain mission as pontifical delegate of the Slovak Archbishop Cyril Vasil, former secretary of the Congregation for Oriental Churches, which did not help to ease the tensions between the Archdiocese of Ernakulam-Angamaly and the rest of the Syro-Malabar Church.
The object of contention, as underlined both by the Vatican News as Asia News, remains the mode of celebration adopted by the Syro-Malabar Synod in 2021, which provides for the celebrant to face the altar during the central moment of the liturgy. A solution that the vast majority of the clergy of Ernakulam-Angamaly - the largest archdiocese of the Syro-Malabar Church, comprising about a tenth of the faithful - does not want to accept, having adopted the rite in which the celebrant faces the assembly after the Second Vatican Council. Thus, the ancient confrontation over the unified liturgy, which has long divided this very ancient Church of the Indias The Orientales remains unresolved.
Pope's warning call
Pope Francis, far from underestimating the gravity of the situation, sends a strong video message to the Archdiocese of Ernakulam-Angamaly, asking that the Eucharistic rite be celebrated next Christmas in all the Churches according to the "unified" modality adopted by the Synod of the Syro-Malabar Church after years of discussion, but rejected by the clergy of the diocese where the seat of the major archbishop is located.
"You are Churches, do not become a sect," Francis says. "Do not force the competent ecclesiastical authority to take note that you have left the Church, because you are no longer in communion with your pastors and with the successor of the apostle Peter, called to confirm all the brothers in the faith and to preserve them in the unity of the Church."
Cardinal Alencherry, who was elected major archbishop by the Syro-Malabar Synod in 2012, since 2017 has been involved in an affair related to a sale of land owned by the Church, which has caused scandal and controversy in the Catholic community of Kerala. In his letter to the cardinal, the Pontiff nevertheless renews his personal esteem, recalling also that Alencherry had already submitted his resignation in 2019, but the Holy See - accepting the opinion of the Synod - had rejected it. Now, therefore, the leadership of the Syro-Malabar Church in accordance with the law has been entrusted to the curial bishop Sebastian Vaniyapurackal, until the election of the new major archbishop, which is expected to take place in January.
New apostolic administrator
As for the Archdiocese of Ernakulam-Angamaly, in accepting the resignation of Msgr. Andrews Thazhath as apostolic administrator (who remains archbishop of Trichur), Francis appointed Msgr. Bosco Puthur, bishop emeritus of the Melbourne eparchy of the Syro-Malabarese, as the new apostolic administrator. Thazhath was also highly questioned for the way he carried out the mandate given to him by Pope Francis to resolve the dispute over the liturgy.
In recent days, a letter also caused a stir, stating that the eight deacons of the diocese awaiting priestly ordination could only be ordained after taking an oath to celebrate the Qurbana (the Eucharistic rite) only in the manner established by the Synod, which, as discussed above, requires the celebrant to face the assembly during the first part of the liturgy, but then turn toward the altar at the moment of consecration.
