Credit: Angelo johns / Wikipedia
CV NEWSFEED // Pope Francis has authorised the process for the beatification of “the Newman of the East” Archbishop Mar Ivanios, who is credited with bringing the Syro-Malankara Church back in communion with Rome in the mid-twentieth century.
According to an AsiaNews report, the Archbishop will now assume the title of “venerable,” which is the first step towards beatification. Ivanios is known as “Newman of the East” because “he walked the path from his spiritual tradition towards his newfound unity with the Catholic Church.”
“The whole Syro-Malankara Catholic Church is very much excited in hearing the news, the good news, that Archbishop Mar Ivanios, the Servant of God, is being elevated to the status of venerable,” said His Beatitude Moran Mor Baselios Cardinal Cleemis in the report, continuing:
His heroic virtues were his unconditional commitment to Providence and a deep communion with the Holy See and the Catholic Church, and his personal, heroic and pious life.
Our Church has been praying fervently for many years and now the time has come to call him, to call our father in faith, as Venerable Father.
It is a great recognition for the Malankara Church and for the holy life of Mar Ivanios. We are grateful to the Holy See and the Holy Father for this great gesture of deep appreciation
Cleemis is the current Archbishop of the Syro-Malankara Church, and the Major Archbishop of Trivandrum.
The Syro-Malankara Catholic Church is an eastern Catholic Church sui iuris. Based in Kerala, India, the Syro-Malankara Church has over 1096 parishes, and employs the West Syriac Rite Divine Liturgy of St James.
The Venerable Archbishop Ivanios was born in September 1882, and is credited with leading the “reunion movement” of the former Malankara Orthodox Church with Rome from the 1920s till his death in 1953.
“Today the Syro-Malankara Church has about half a million members, mostly in Kerala, but also in some diaspora communities in Europe and North America,” the report concluded.
