Story of Tradition: St. Thomas and his Christians

I intended this post to be in honor of St. Thomas the Apostle whose feast day I thought was today. I later found out it was Thomas Aquinas' feast but I wanted to finish the post anyway.

The Catholic Church in India is comprised of three different groups. The Syro-Malabar Catholic Church, The Syro-Malankara Catholic Church and the Roman Catholic Church.

The Syro-Malabar Catholic Church is one of the Eastern Catholic Churches in full communion with Rome that trace their origin from St. Thomas the Apostle who is said to have come to India in 52 a.d. There are 5 million Indian Catholics that belong to this Church. This Church has its own liturgy derived from the East Syriac Rite of the the Catholic Church. The Church is governed by its own hierarchy that are subject to the Pope.

The other native Indian Catholic Church is The Syro-Malankara Catholic Church. The population of this church is much smaller than the Syro-Malabar with only 500,000 adherents the majority of whom live in India in the southern state of Kerala.

The Liturgy of the Syro-Malankara is derived from the West Syriac Rite of the Catholic Church  and is also governed by its own hierarchy of bishops subject to the Pope.

Like the Syro-Malabar Church, The Syro-Malankara Church also traces its origin to St. Thomas when he came to India.

The Roman or Latin rite Catholics in India trace their origin to the Missionary work of St. Francis Xavier.

The Catholic Indians have derived their Culture from three different sources Hindu, Syrian and Portuguese Colonial era. These influences blended together has given Indian Catholics their own Independent Identity.

To the mentality of Indians, including Indian Catholics, to worship a deity requires something visual. As a result of this, images of Christ and the Saints are very important to Indians.

Throughout the areas where Catholicism is prominent, there are Shrines that attract many pilgrims who consider their pilgrimages there as important times in their lives.

One interesting practice that is really a Hindu practice adapted to Catholicism is the leaving of an offering of either Salt, Peppercorn, Coconut or other sweets at a statue of a Saint. This practice is called Prasdam. The Prasdam or Offering left at the Statue is considered sanctified by that particular Saint. The Offering is left by those devoted to the Saint as a gift to others who are devoted to the Saint. These other devotees who receive the gift consider it a gift from the Saint himself.

Processions and Parish Feasts are extremely important to Indian Catholics who spare no expense in conducting extremely elaborate and colorful events. These feasts are held throughout the year except during Lent. Processions can include decorated Elephants carrying images of Saints, Colorful Umbrellas, Statues carried on shoulder palanquins and decorated chariots.

Feasts are so elaborate in fact that a bishop in India was concerned that a huge portion of the Parish's funds were going to feasts. This forced him to restrict feasts to only nine days.


Like the rest of the world the Catholic Church in India has some problems,  the greatest being the rise of the Catholic Charismatic movement and the local bishops' acceptance of it.

Thankfully unlike most of the Catholic world, Communion in the hand is not allowed.

Like Indian Society as a whole the "Caste" system is present in the mentality of Indian Catholics. Most Non Latin Indian Catholics Consider themselves to be of the high caste Nambudiri Brahman. Interestingly Latin Rite Catholics in India are of a Lower Caste than the Syro-Malabars and Malankaras.

The Catholics in India carry on a Catholic Rite that is as old as the Church herself and are a people that see their Traditions as something to be proud of (unlike their western brothers in the Church that seem to consider their heritage something irrelevant and undesirable in their lives).

It is good to remember that there are more than just "Western" Catholics in the Church and that East and West both have different beautiful expressions of the same True Religion, Catholicism.




I derived the information for this post from https://www.catholicsandcultures.org