The Syro-Malankara Catholic Church in America: How a Kerala Reunion Movement Built a Home in the U.S.
From a 1930 Reunion in Kerala to a Cathedral in Elmont, New York
The Syro-Malankara Catholic Church in America: How a Kerala Reunion Movement Built a Home in the U.S.
Ninety-six years after a small group of Malankara Christians in southern India chose reunion with Rome, their spiritual descendants worship in more than two dozen parishes across the United States and Canada.
The Syro-Malankara Catholic Church in America — At a Glance
- Origin
- Kerala, India • Reunion with Rome began in 1930
- Liturgical Tradition
- West Syriac Rite
- US/Canada Mission Began
- 2001, under Pope John Paul II
- Exarchate Established
- 2010
- Raised to Eparchy
- January 4, 2016
- Current Name
- Eparchy of St. Mary, Queen of Peace, USA & Canada
- Cathedral
- St. Vincent de Paul, Elmont, New York
- Current Bishop
- Philipos Mar Stephanos, installed October 28, 2017
The 1930 Reunion in Kerala
The story of Syro-Malankara Catholics in America begins nearly a century earlier and half a world away, among the Saint Thomas Christians of Kerala, on India's southwestern coast, who trace their origins to the apostolic mission the Church of the East credits to the apostle Thomas himself. Centuries of division within that ancient community produced a Malankara Church that had, by the early twentieth century, entered communion with the Syriac Orthodox tradition. In 1930, a movement led by Archbishop Mar Ivanios brought a portion of that Malankara community back into full communion with Rome, forming what would become the Syro-Malankara Catholic Church, a distinct sui iuris Eastern Catholic Church following the West Syriac liturgical tradition rather than starting a new one from scratch.
That reunion is the foundation everything in this article stands on. Every parish now operating in the United States and Canada exists because of a decision made in Kerala nearly a century ago, carried forward first by immigration and later by deliberate ecclesiastical planning from Rome itself.
Part II
A Mission to North America Begins
Formal ecclesiastical attention to Syro-Malankara Catholics in North America began on June 18, 2001, when Pope John Paul II appointed Msgr. Isaac Thottunkal, then Vicar General of the Eparchy of Bathery, as Titular Bishop of Chayal and Apostolic Visitator for Syro-Malankara faithful across North America and Europe. He was ordained a bishop that August, taking the name Isaac Mar Cleemis, the same churchman who would eventually rise to become the Church's Major Archbishop-Catholicos. The following year, on May 15, 2002, Archbishop Cyril Mar Baselios formally submitted a request to the Holy See for a stable canonical structure to serve the growing number of Syro-Malankara families who had emigrated to the United States and Canada.
After Isaac Mar Cleemis was transferred to the Eparchy of Tiruvalla in 2003, the mission continued under Rev. Dr. Joseph Konnathu, appointed Apostolic Visitator in January 2005 and ordained bishop as Joseph Mar Thomas the following month. He would guide the North American mission until 2010.
Part III
From Apostolic Visitator to Exarchate
In 2010, the mission took its first major structural step forward: an Apostolic Exarchate for Syro-Malankara Catholics was established in the United States, with Thomas Mar Eusebius Naickamparambil ordained bishop on September 21, 2010, at Saint Mary's Cathedral in Trivandrum and installed as its first eparch. An exarchate sits a rung below a full eparchy in Eastern Catholic canon law, a transitional structure for a community still building the parish infrastructure a permanent diocese requires. Under Bishop Eusebius, that infrastructure grew steadily across the United States and Canada through the following years.
Part IV
Becoming a Full Eparchy
On January 4, 2016, the exarchate was raised to full eparchial status and given its permanent name: the Syro-Malankara Catholic Eparchy of St. Mary, Queen of Peace, of the United States of America and Canada, headquartered at the Cathedral of St. Vincent de Paul in Elmont, New York. Bishop Eusebius, who had led the community since 2010, was subsequently named the first bishop of the newly created Eparchy of Parassala in India, and on August 5, 2017, Pope Francis appointed Philipos Mar Stephanos, then Auxiliary Bishop of Tiruvalla, as the American eparchy's second bishop. He was installed at the cathedral in Elmont on October 28, 2017, and continues to lead the eparchy today.
Part V
The Church in America Today
The Eparchy of St. Mary, Queen of Peace now oversees parishes and missions spread across the United States and Canada, gathered under a single cathedral in Elmont, New York, but serving communities from coast to coast. Parish life follows patterns familiar to any immigrant Eastern Catholic community in North America: Sunday Divine Liturgy, catechism classes for children, monthly prayer meetings held in parishioners' homes, and an annual celebration on July 15 honoring Mar Ivanios, the archbishop whose leadership of the 1930 reunion movement made every one of these American parishes possible in the first place.
FAQ
Frequently Asked Questions
A Nearly Century-Old Decision, Still Bearing Fruit
Every Syro-Malankara parish in the United States and Canada today traces back to a choice made in Kerala in 1930, carried across an ocean by immigration and given permanent structure by Rome one careful step at a time: visitator, exarch, eparch. Ninety-six years on, that decision is still building parishes.
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