Rome appoints apostolic visitor for Kerala congregation

By Matters India Reporters

New Delhi: The Vatican Congregation for the Oriental Churches has appointed an apostolic visitor for the Kerala-based Missionary Congregation of the Blessed Sacrament (MCBS).

An October 13 letter from the Apostolic Nunciature in Delhi to MCBS superior general Father Joseph Maleparampil said Rome has appointed Carmelites of Mary Immaculate Father Paul Achandy as the apostolic visiror to the 87-year-old congregation.

The appointment, done with Pope Francis’ knowledge, is “Ad Nutum Sanctae Sedis,” a Latin term meaning “at the disposition of the Holy See.” It refers to any circumstance involving a conflict of ecclesiastical jurisdiction, where Rome decides to take the matter under its own jurisdiction and reserves to itself the right to make a final judgment on the matter.

Father Achandy is currently the chancellor of the Bengaluru-Based Christ University. He is also the rector of the Dharmaram College, a major seminary managed by his congregation adjacent to the university.

The 57-year-old priest took over as the vice chancellor on September 21.

He is an alumnus of Dharmaram College and former staff of the university when it was a college.

Father Achandy has Master of Business Administration from North Maharashtra University in 1995 and a doctorate in Management from the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Madras in 2002. His area of specialization has been strategic human resource management.

He has published several research papers in national journals and has been a resource speaker at many national conferences in the country.

Father Achandy has held several administrative in the past 14 year. His confrere Father Mathew Chandrankunnel, director of Ecumenical Christian Centre, Bengaluru, told Matters India in 2019 that Father Achandy handles his responsibilities with spiritual animation and management skills filled up with compassion and affection.

Father Achandy is known for his simplicity, erudition and humility, qualities that would come handy in his new job, his friends say.

The MCBS congregation was founded by Fathers Mathew Alakalam and Joseph Paredom on May 7, 1933, with the support of Bishop James Kalachery of Changanacherry.

They began at Mallapally near Changanacherry but later shifted to the Little Flower Ashram in Kaduvakulam, 28 km northwest. The ashram is considered the congregation’s mother house. The founders entrusted to its members, as their spiritual heritage, a religious life marked by love and single-minded devotion to the Eucharistic Lord and missionary vitality.

The congregation was raised to the pontifical status on December 2, 1989. The congregation has two provinces– Kottayam and Kozhikode – in Kerala and region, Satara in the western Indian state of Maharashtra.

The two places the congregation works outside Kerala are Shimoga district in Karnataka and Satara and Solapur districts in Maharashtra. It has missions also in Rajasthan and Tamil Nadu, a residences in Italy and Germany. Its priests work in Australia, North America and the Philippines.

This is the second time this year that Rome intervenes in the administration of religious congregations in India.

On May 16, the Claretian congregation replaced its Bangalore provincial with a Vatican official as the delegate of the superior general.

The congregation’s Rome-based General Government took the decision to replace Father Jacob Arakkal with the delegate, after accepting his resignation.

The general government then appointed Father Jose Koonamparampil as the “Delegate of Superior General” with powers to animate the province and prepare for the provincial chapter in December this year.

The first Rome intervention in an Indian congregation took place in 1990, when Pope appointed Father Varkey Vithayathil as the apostolic administrator of the Asirvanam Benedictine Monastery in Bangalore, a post he held for six years.

Father Vithayathil was then appointed the provincial of Redemptorist congregation for India and Sri Lanka. Later he was made the head of the Syro-Malabar Church in 1999 and a cardinal in 2001.