Renowned Scholar of International Repute

Baselios Mar Thoma Mathews II

It is with immense joy that we write this Forward for the book “The Orthodox Syrian Church in Bangalore (1943 - 1993)”. T his Church began fifty years ago as a small community with no church of its own for its worship. Realising this situation, Father M.P. Mathews Modisseril who was my confession Father and Spiritual guide took the initiative and Started off Sunday Services once a month for this small community with permission from the then Catholicos, my predecessor. Modisseril Achen's name will be remembered as a pioneer in this great effort.

In 1947 the Holy Trinity Church was given to the 0rthodox community for its regular worship on Sundays and other days of importance in the Church's calendar. The services continued after Modisseril Achen's departure two years later. But it is only with the coming of Father V.C. Samuel in 1950 with Kalpana from the Diocesan Metropolitan Mar Theodosius that the Orthodox people have regular services without fail. In this way the 0rthodox had regular programme of worship in the Holy Trinity Church from 1950. Meanwhile in 1968 the land for constructing the St. Gregorios Church was bought where the Church was built in 1972 and consecrated.

In 1966 a plot ft land to build a church on was purchased in Jalahalli, where the building was completed by the end of the year. This church building was made much larger and more beautiful by 1993. People in various parts of the city contributed towards building churches and chapels in the city. All this we believe is the work of God through the whole hearted co-operati0n of our people. May God almighty bless them in all their undertaking. I would like to put on record the valuable services rendered by all the priests of our church who were of great help to our community at Bangalore for the last fifty years. They were the real force for all the success there.

This book is intended to help people mainly to understand the history of the church in Bangalore. We have come from Kerala, where we have a long history. Our Malankara Orthodox Church is an ancient Church of India and it traces its origin to as far back as A.D. 52, when St. Thomas, one of the disciples of Jesus Christ, came to India and established Christianity in the South Western parts of our sub-continent.

Although the St. Thomas Christians or the Syrian Christians exist at present in different churches and denominations, a major section of the parent body of St. Thomas Christians which has maintained its independent nature constitutes the Orthodox Church under the Catholicate of the East with its headquarters at Devalokam, Kottayam.

Orthodox Church has an apostolic foundation. It is an autonomous, Autocephalous, Independent, National Church of India. Although majority of the members of the church numbering about 2.2 million live in Kerala, they could be found now spread over not only in all the different states of India, but also in all the continents throughout the world. There are a total of 21 Dioceses now, 15 of them in Kerala and 6 of them outside Kerala i.e. Madras, Bombay, Calcutta, Delhi, America and the new Diocese of Canada - U.K. - Europe.

We have to realise fully our responsibility before the Lord for our church. We have to continue our efforts to give necessary guidance and directions to our people to pray confess, believe, bear witness and live a life of grace in Christ and to see that their spiritual experience fully corresponds to the experience on the past centuries of the history of our Malankara Orthodox Church. We have to uphold the True Faith and maintain the great traditions of our church. In fact, our believers are the main force of our church.

We are happy that we could get the valuable services of Father Dr. V.C. Samuel for writing this book. He is a renowned scholar of international repute and has a very good record of writing several books of historical and theological importance to his credit. May God Almighty grant him grace and strength for many more years of blessed service in this world! With best wishes and blessings●

(Foreword of the book: 50 GOLDEN YEARS: published in commemoration of the Golden Jubilee Celebration of the Orthodox Syrian Church Service at Bangalore, on 15.5.1994 at St. Gregorios Orthodox Church, Bangalore – 1994.)