Malankara Church

Kerala (Indian) tradition is that Apostle St. Thomas established Christianity in Malankara in AD 52; it got organized and prospered with the arrival a group of Syrian Christians (Knanaites) from Urhoy (Edessa) in AD 345. The leadership of these Antiochean missionaries gave the local Christian community a new life, the Church in Malankara (Kerala) thereon adopted the rites & liturgies of the Syrian Church of Antioch and became a part of that ancient Patriarchal See.Thus the early Christian converts (St.Thomas Christians) along with the new Christian settlers (Knanaites), came to be called 'the Syrian Christians'. The Church in Malankara continued to be under the jurisdiction of the Patriarch of Antioch, and his subordinate in the East, the Catholicos/Maphriyono, till the arrival of Nestorian bishops in 1490. Read more

Patriarch Of Antioch & All The East

The spiritual care of the Church of Antioch was vested in the Bishop of Antioch from the earliest years of Christianity. The first among the Bishops of Antioch was St. Peter who is believed to have established a church at Antioch in AD 37. Given the antiquity of the bishopric of Antioch and the importance of the Church in the city of Antioch which was a commercially significant city in the eastern parts of the Roman Empire, the Synod of Nicaea (AD 325) recognized the bishopric as a Patriarchate along with the bishoprics of Rome, Alexandria, and Jerusalem, bestowing authority for the Church in Antioch and All of the East on the Patriarch. (The Synod of Constantinople in AD 381 recognized the See of Constantinople also as a Patriarchate). Even though the Synod of Nicaea was convened by the Roman Emperor Constantine, the authority of the ecumenical synod was also accepted by the Church in the Persian Empire which was politically isolated from the Churches in the Roman Empire. Until AD 498, this Church accepted the spiritual authority of the Patriarch of Antioch. Read more

Catholicose of the East

'CATHOLICOS OF THE EAST' was originally the title conferred to the ecclesiastical head of the Christian congregation in the erstwhile Persian Empire that extended from Mesopotamia in the west, to the boundaries of the present day Afghanistan and Northern India in the east. In the beginning the bishop who assumed this title was known as MAJOR METROPOLITAN / CATHOLICOS OF SELEUCIA; Seleucia being the capital city of Persian Empire. This institution was initially set up to serve as a link between the Patriarch of Antioch, and the Syrian Christian Community in Persia who found the journey to the Patriarchate at Antioch, hazardous because of the bitter political rivalry between the Roman and Persian empires. Read more