Loading...
Loading...
Click here if you don’t see subscription options

The Vatican and many of the Latin-rite bishops of India are not treating the Syro-Malabar Catholic Church with justice, Auxiliary Bishop Bosco Puthur of Ernakulam-Angamaly in Kerala, India, told Pope Benedict XVI on April 7 during an ad limina visit to Rome. While other Christians and other religions enjoy the freedom to build churches and conduct services anywhere in India, the Eastern Catholic churches “are denied it, paradoxically not by the state, but by our own ecclesiastical authorities,” the bishop said. Generally the leaders of Eastern Catholic churches, like the Syro-Malabar Church, enjoy full freedom to elect bishops and erect dioceses only in their church’s traditional territory; otherwise, the responsibility is left to the pope, often in consultation with the Latin-rite bishops of the region concerned. Bishop Puthur told Pope Benedict that the Syro-Malabar church’s traditional territory was all of India until Latin-rite missionaries arrived in the 15th century. Now any of its faithful who live outside Kerala State are subject to the authority of the local Latin-rite bishop.

Comments are automatically closed two weeks after an article's initial publication. See our comments policy for more.

The latest from america

Delegates hold "Mass deportation now!" signs on Day 3 of the Republican National Convention at the Fiserv Forum in Milwaukee July 17, 2024. (OSV News photo/Brian Snyder, Reuters)
Around the affluent world, new hostility, resentment and anxiety has been directed at immigrant populations that are emerging as preferred scapegoats for all manner of political and socio-economic shortcomings.
Kevin ClarkeNovember 21, 2024
“Each day is becoming more difficult, but we do not surrender,” Father Igor Boyko, 48, the rector of the Greek Catholic seminary in Lviv, told Gerard O’Connell. “To surrender means we are finished.”
Gerard O’ConnellNovember 21, 2024
Many have questioned how so many Latinos could support a candidate like DonaldTrump, who promised restrictive immigration policies. “And the answer is that, of course, Latinos are complicated people.”
J.D. Long GarcíaNovember 21, 2024
Vice President Kamala Harris delivers her concession speech for the 2024 presidential election on Nov. 6, 2024, on the campus of Howard University in Washington. (AP Photo/Stephanie Scarbrough)
Catholic voters were a crucial part of Donald J. Trump’s re-election as president. But did misogyny and a resistance to women in power cause Catholic voters to disregard the common good?
Kathleen BonnetteNovember 21, 2024