The Saint Thomas Christians, also called Syrian Christians of India, Marthoma Suriyani Nasrani, Malankara Nasrani, or Nasrani Mappila, are an ethno-religious community of Indian Christians in the state of Kerala, who, for the most part, employ the Eastern and Western liturgical rites of Syriac Christianity. They trace their origins to the evangelistic activity of Thomas the Apostle in the 1st century. The Saint Thomas Christians had been historically a part of the hierarchy of the Church of the East but are now divided into several different Eastern Catholic, Oriental Orthodox, Protestant, and independent bodies, each with their own liturgies and traditions. They are Malayalis and speak Malayalam. Nasrani or Nazarene is a Syriac term for Christians, who were among the first converts to Christianity in the Near East.
The Syro-Malabar Catholic Church, is an Eastern Catholic Church based in Kerala, India. It is sui iuris (autonomous) particular Church in full communion with the Pope and the worldwide Catholic Church, including the Latin Church and the 22 other Eastern Catholic Churches, with self-governance under the Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches (CCEO). The Church is headed by the Major Archbishop of the Syro-Malabar, currently vacant. The Syro-Malabar Synod of Bishops canonically convoked and presided over by the Major Archbishop constitutes the supreme authority of the Church. The Major Archiepiscopal Curia of the Church is based in Kakkanad, Kochi. Syro-Malabar is a prefix reflecting the church's use of the East Syriac Rite liturgy and origins in Malabar. The name has been in usage in official Vatican documents since the nineteenth century.
The Malankara Mar Thoma Syrian Church, often shortened to Mar Thoma Church, and known also as the Reformed Syrian Church and the Mar Thoma Syrian Church of Malabar, is an autonomous Oriental Protestant Christian church based in Kerala, India. While continuing many of the Syriac high church practices, the church is Protestant in its theology and doctrines. It employs a reformed variant of the West Syriac Rite Divine Liturgy of Saint James, translated to Malayalam.
Malankara Metropolitan is an ecclesiastical title given to the head of the Malankara Syrian Church.
The Kerala Brethren are a significant subset of the Open Brethren movement. In the South Indian State of Kerala, four Syrian Christian (Nasrani) men who came from traditional churches were baptised in 1898, and many of the Kerala Brethren consider this event to have been the start of their movement. Some 600 of the 2,200 Brethren assemblies in India are located in Kerala.
The Malabar Independent Syrian Church (MISC) also known as the Thozhiyur Church, is a Christian church centred in Kerala, India. It is one of the churches of the Saint Thomas Christian community, which traces its origins to the evangelical activity of Thomas the Apostle in the 1st century.
The Maramon Convention, a Christian convention in Asia, is held at Maramon, Pathanamthitta, Kerala, India annually in February on the vast sand-bed of the Pampa River next to the Kozhencherry Bridge. It is organised by Mar Thoma Evangelistic Association, the missionary wing of the Malankara Mar Thoma Syrian Church.
Palakunnathu Abraham Malpan, was an Indian cleric and theologian known for the Reformation movement within the Malankara Church during the 19th century. He was born in the ancient Syrian Christian Palakunnathu family which practiced West Syriac Rite Oriental Orthodoxy after the Coonan Cross Oath of 1653.
The term Eastern Protestant Christianity encompasses a range of heterogeneous Protestant Christian denominations that developed outside of the Occident, from the latter half of the nineteenth century, and yet retain certain elements of Eastern Christianity. Some of these denominations came into existence when active Protestant churches adopted reformational variants of Eastern and Oriental Orthodox liturgy and worship, while others are the result of reformations of Orthodox beliefs and practices, inspired by the teachings of Western Protestant missionaries.
Titus II Mar Thoma Metropolitan (Mar Thoma XVI) (6 May 1866 – 6 July 1944) was the head of the Malankara Mar Thoma Syrian Church with its center in Kerala state in south-western India. He was known as Thithoos Dwitheeyan Mar Thoma Metropolitan among his people. (Thithoos is Aramaic and Malayalam)
Mar Dionysius I (Mar Thoma VI) (died 8 April 1808), was the 6th Metropolitan of the Malankara Syrian Church from 1765 until his death. A member of the Pakalomattom family (Thazhmon, Ayroor) he appealed to outside authorities to assert his position as the sole leader of the Malankara Church and to attempt to reunite all the Saint Thomas Christians.
The Mar Thoma Syrian Church in Malaysia is the Malaysian zone of the Diocese of Malaysia, Singapore & Australia in the Malankara Mar Thoma Syrian Church. It currently consists of a total of 16 parishes with 2,500 members nationwide.
The Diocese of North America & Europe is a diocese of the Malankara Mar Thoma Syrian Church that includes all the parishes in the North American and European continents. Its headquarters is at Sinai Mar Thoma Centre, Merrick, New York.The present Diocesan bishop is Issac Mar Philoxenos Episcopa. As of 2020 there are 71 parishes and 7 congregations under this diocese.
The Malankara Church, also known as Puthenkur, is the historic unified body of West Syriac Saint Thomas Christian denominations which claim ultimate origins from the missions of Thomas the Apostle. This community, under the leadership of Thoma I, opposed the Padroado Jesuits as well as the Propaganda Carmelites of the Latin Church, following the historical Coonan Cross Oath of 1653. The Malankara Church's divisions and branchings have resulted in present-day Churches that include the Jacobite Syrian Christian Church, the Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church, the Malankara Mar Thoma Syrian Church, the Malabar Independent Syrian Church, the Syro-Malankara Catholic Church, the Saint Thomas Anglicans of the Church of South India and the St. Thomas Evangelical Church of India.
Christianity is the third-largest practiced religion in Kerala, accounting for 18% of the population according to the 2001 Indian census. According to traditional accounts, Thomas the Apostle sailed to the Malabar region in 52 AD and introduced Christianity to the area. Although a minority, the Christian population of Kerala is proportionally much larger than that of India as a whole. A significant portion of the Indian Christian population resides in the state.
Most churches in Kerala follow the tradition of Syrian Christians, known as Saint Thomas Christians. The remainder of religious people in Kerala are Latin Catholics, or part of a minority of Protestant Christians.
The Saint Thomas Christian denominations are Christian denominations from Kerala, India, which traditionally trace their ultimate origins to the evangelistic activity of Thomas the Apostle in the 1st century. They are also known as "Nasranis" as well. The Syriac term "Nasrani" is still used by St. Thomas Christians in Kerala.
Saint Thomas Anglicans are the Saint Thomas Christian members of the Church of South India; the self-governing South Indian province of the Anglican Communion. They are among the several different ecclesiastical communities that splintered out of the once undivided Saint Thomas Christians; an ancient Christian community whose origins goes back to the first century missionary activities of Saint Thomas the Apostle, in the present-day South Indian state of Kerala. The Apostle, as legend has it, arrived in Malankara in AD 52.
The Holy Qurobo or Holy Qurbono refers to the Eucharist as celebrated in Syro-Antiochene Rite and the liturgical books containing rubrics for its celebration. West Syriac Rite includes various descendants of the Oriental Orthodox and Eastern Catholic churches. It consists of two distinct liturgical traditions: the Maronite Rite, and the Jacobite Rite. The major Anaphora of both the traditions is the Divine Liturgy of Saint James in Syriac language. The Churches are primarily based in the Middle East, Africa, and India.
