Missionary Society of St Thomas

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1 The Missionary Society of St Thomas the Apostle
2 The HISTORY
3 The Founder
4 The General Assembly 2008
5 External Links

[edit] The Missionary Society of St Thomas the Apostle

The Missionary Society of St Thomas the Apostle is a Catholic Missionary organization founded in 1968 in Kerala. It is the missionary of the Syro Malabar Church, for missionary work in less Christian areas in and outside India. It was founded by the late Bp Sebastian Vayalil. This was formed as a collective emergence of missionary consciousness in Kerala.

For organisational purpose the Society functions as regions. There are three officially declared regions. They are Ujjain in M.P., Mandya in Karnataka, and Sangli in Maharashtra. There are 300 priests working as full time members of the Society. All of them belong to the Syro Malabar Church.

Apart form that a few priests are working in various other continents as pastors. MST in USA is an extension of the MST in Kerala.

[edit] The HISTORY

THE Missionary Society of St Thomas the Apostle MST) is fast approaching the 40th anniversary of its, canonical erection. MST was formally inaugurated on 22 February 1968. Within these forty years the Society has made stupendous development in all fields. Today with a membership of above 300 priests and three large mission regions under her protection, the Society can validly claim that she has been faithful in carrying out her duties as the Missionary Institute of the Syro-Malabar Church. But many of the members, especially the young generation, may not be aware of the humble beginnings the Society had and the circumstances that led to the establishment of the Society. This article is a modest attempt to retrace the history of the beginning of the Society and to make ourselves aware of the great responsibility that we have inherited from our visionary founder.

[edit] The Founder

Before we embark upon a real historiography, we shall dedicate a few lines to speak about the founder himself. Who is the real founder of MST has always been a point of debate. Though we have several founder members, we have only one founder: the Bishop of Pala His Excellency Mar Sebastian Vayalil. He was a real visionary with a historical mission. He was well aware of the great missionary mandate that the Syro Malabar Church had inherited. At a time when it was hard for the western missionaries to come to India and when there was a surge in the missionary interest among the St Thomas Christians, Mar Vayalil thought of an association of missionaries of the Church of St Thomas Christians. It is not difficult for anyone who goes through the annals of the history of the beginning of MST to see that MST was the result of the farsightedness and the missionary vision of Mar Sebastian Vayalil.

Fr Joseph Maliparampil writes, “St Thomas Missionary Society is the fruition of a long cherished vision of the ‘missionary Bishop’, Mar Sebastian Vayalil that the SyroMalabar Church should have an association of missionaries”1. A founder is one who gives birth to a new ideology or an institute or establishment. Similar thoughts and ideas may have been well in circulation, but it is the one who gives concrete form to them who is regarded as the founder. There could have been several people who had nurtured the idea of forming a missionary institute. But it was Bishop Vayalil who visualized it as an institute of the Church and gave concrete form to it, of course with the help of his priests. In the words of Cardinal Lourdsamy, it was in 1962 “that the Missionary Society of St Thomas the Apostle began to take shape in the vision of late Mar Sebastian Vayalil, then Bishop of Palai”2. The initiatives taken by him and the cooperation and support extended by other prelates of the Church really paved the way for the foundation of the Society. In the report of the Director General presented at theb General Assembly of 19Th we read, “... it is the Bishop of Palai who took initiatives on his own accord and on behalf of the Hierarchy to give shape to this missionary project,’ encouraged as he was by the Holy Father himself and the Cardinal Prefects of the Sacred Congregations of the Oriental Churches and Propaganda Fide”3.

[edit] The General Assembly 2008

The 8th Ordinary General assembly of the Missionary Society of St Thomas the Apostle began on 14th May 2008 at its Central House, Melampara, Bharananganam. The supreme representative body of the Society was formally concluded on 24th May at 3.30. p. m. The new members of the General Council elected by the General Assembly to guide the Society for the next five years are the following:

Fr James Athikalam - Director General Fr Paul Mudathotty - Vice Director General(First Councillor) Fr Thomas Chirackal - Second Councillor Fr Antony Perumanoor - Third Councillor Fr Mathew Elavumkal - Fourth Councillor Fr Kurian Kochettonnil - Treasurer General

Portfolios assigned Fr Paul Mudathotty - Formation and Ongoing Formation Fr Thomas Chirackal - Education and Social Apostolate Fr Antony Perumanoor - Secretary General Fr Mathew Elavumkal - Priests’ Welfare and Communion Fr Kurian Kochettonnil - Communication and Mission Animation