A brief history of St.

Thomas
Evangelical Church of India

Early Christianity in Kerala

The early Christian traditions in Kerala gives a strong proof that St. Thomas, One of the
twelve disciples of Jesus Christ, landed at Maliankara, near Cranganore in 52 A.D, preached Gospel
and founded seven churches in different places of Kerala such as Maliankara, Palayur, Kottakavu,
Quilon, Niranom, Nilakkal, and Chayal. After several years of work in Kerala, the Apostle went to the
Coromandel Coast (East Coast) where he was assassinated in 72 A.D. For the first three centuries
early church had no much historical evidence for the existence of the Church in Kerala. In the 4th
century a group of Christians came to Travancore ( India) under the leadership of One Thomas of
Cana (Syria-Palestine) and settled here. He found scatted Christians in Kerala and he took initiative
to organise them. Hence, the church in Kerala is known as Syrian Christians. In 6th century they came
into contact with Nestorian (Ancient church of East) and that contact continued till the coming of
Portuguese in Kerala in 16th Century.

In the beginning the relation between Kerala Christians and Portuguese Christians was
acceptable as fellow Christians. As mutual knowledge had been increased, the difference between
them became more and more vivid. The Portuguese who were Roman Catholics believed that their
church was the only true form of the church in its doctrines and practices and Pope the Vicar of
Christ for all the universe. They considered their duty was to organise these neglected Kerala
Christians by bringing them under the banner of Roman Catholic Church. In the first half of the
sixteenth century they began their attempt to introduce among Kerala Christians the teachings of
Catholicism and to encourage them to accept their belief.

When the new archbishop named Alexis De Manezes came to Goa, the effort of bringing Kerala
Church into Roman Catholic fold had been accelerated. There was an opinion that the main obstacle
for bringing Kerala church under Roman Catholic fold was the connection of Kerala Christians with
the Eastern Church. In order to break that relationship, Archbishop Menezes determined that no
successor should arrive from Mesopotamia(Syria) after the death of Mar Abraham, Bishop of Kerala
Church and he succeeded in doing that . In 1599 A.D Archbishop Menezes visited Kerala and forcibly
converted Kerala Christians into Roman Catholic belief. He burnt all the Syrian Christian literature,
specially the liturgy of the Church in order to avoid the influence of the Syrian tradition into Kerala
Christian tradition.

A small group of Kerala Christian resisted the Roman Catholic endeavour, but it was in vain.
However, under the leadership of Archdeacon Thomas, 25000 brave Kerala Christian marched to in
front of the stone cross at Mattachery church compound in Cochin on Friday, January 24, 1653 (M.E.
828 Makaram 3) and declared that they and their descendant are no more subjected to the Roman
Archbishop and the Pope. They promised that they would adhere to the faith and practice of St.
Thomas Christians. Those who were not able to touch the cross tied ropes on the cross, held the
rope in their hands and made the oath. Because of the weight it is said that the cross bent a little
and so it is known as "Oath of the bent cross (Coonen Kurisu Sathyam) "

The Jacobite Church

The re-established Kerala Christian or St. Thomas Christian church, after the Coonan Cross,
consecrated Mar Thoma 1 as Metropolitan by the laying on of hands of twelve presbyters of the
church and came under the influence of Jacobite Church of Antioch within a decade.They had
adopted many of the doctrines and the practices of Antiochean church and Roman Catholic Church
due to their influence within five decades and several of them were not truly biblical and sound.

The Ministry and the influence of Church Missionary society (C.M.S)

In the beginning of the 19th Century, Syrian Christians received considerable favour from
the British residents of the state of Travancore and Cochin. A seminary was established at Kottayam
in 1813 for the education of the clergy with financial help from Colonel John Munro, who was the
British Resident of Travancore (1810-1819). He also requested Church Missionary Society in England
to send missionaries for working among Christians in Kerala. In respect of his request, Rev. Thomas
Norton was the first CMS missionary who came to Travancore in 1816. He was soon followed by
Benjamin Bailey in the same year, Joseph Fenn in 1818, and Henry Baker in 1819. These missionaries
taught in seminary, visited the Syrian churches and preached the Gospel. Further, they translated
the Bible into Malayalam language. Mar Dionysios IV, The Metropolitan of Jacobite Syrian Church
was uncomfortable with the work of CMS missionaries and broke the relationship with them in
1836. So the missionaries were forced to organise a separate CMS Church in 1840 for the people
who accepted their teachings.

The formation of Mar Thoma church

The accessibility of the Word of God and the influences of the CMS missionaries helped some of the
Syrian church members to think about to have reformation in their church. It was mainly due to the
effort of Palakunnathu Rev. Abraham Malpan (Malpan means Syriac teacher), Kaithayil Rev. Gee
Varghese and a few others. Abraham Malpan is known as the Martin Luther of the Malankara
(Kerala) church. He made some alterations in the liturgy and used it in his own parish at Maramon in
1836. For that reason, he was excommunicated from the Church.
The Metropolitan was against any reformation. During the time of Metropolitan Mathews Mar
Athanasious (1843), the nephew of Rev. Abraham Malpan, the reformation spread to other parishes.
The progress of the reformation was resisted by the authorities of the church from every nook and
corner. The reformers realized that the church was steeped in ritualism, lifeless sacraments and
superstitions. In a memorandum submitted by Abraham Malpan and his associates to Col. Munro,
British Resident in Travancore and Cochin, requesting his help and support. In fact, only way open to
them, after ten years of vain strain and struggle, was to separate. And the result was the official
formation of mar Thoma Syrian Church of Malabar in 1889, for which the first Metropolitan was
Thomas Mar Athanasious, son of Abraham Malpan.
Metropolitan Thomas Mar Athanasious was a pious person and a strong evangelical.
Under his patronage, even before the formation of the Mar Thoma church, the reformation party of
the Syrian church formed Mar Thoma Evangelistic Association (MTEA) in 1888 for evangelistic work
which was the first of its kind in Kerala. The Mar Thoma Church grew up as an independent,
indigenous, Episcopal, evangelical church. Its sole basis for all matters of faith was the open Bible.
The church believed in the priest-hood of all believers, salvation was by grace through faith in Jesus
Christ and not by sacraments or by good works, rejected prayers for dead and invocation of saints,
bread and wine used in holy communion were only the symbols of the body and blood of Jesus
Christ and rejected the doctrine of Transubstantiation, Consubstantiation, and Localisation.
The church grew in strength extending its sphere of influence in distant places. The repeated
revivals in the church played a very significant part in the phenomenal development of the Mar
Thoma Church in its early days. Two key figures behind the revivals in the Mar Thoma church during
the early part of the 20th century were Sadhu Kochu Kunju Upadeshi and Punjammannil Mamman
Upadeshi. In the first half of the 20th century, under the initiative of Bishop Abraham Mar Thoma,
movements such as The Mar Thoma Suvisesha Sevika Sangham or the Women’s Evangelical
Association in 1919 and the Men’s Voluntary Evangelistic Association in 1924 were formed. Bishop
Abraham brought about several novel plans for the spread of the gospel such as Voluntarism,
Ashram Movement, Parish Mission, Sadhu Jathi Mission (Mission among the backward class),
Videsha Mission (Foreign Mission).

The anti reformists

While the church was advancing in all the spheres of its life and mission, there was an
anti- reformation group silently working its way up from the early decades of the 20th century. It is
about this group that Bishop Abraham wrote, in his circular letter dated 8th March 1923:

We must note that we have opposition to face. The enemy is active wherever the work of the
Lord prospers. There is a band of young men who are against all missionary enterprises, also
are ritualistic in their thinking and who wants to undo the work of reformation that has been
going on for some years, and bring the church back to sacerdotalism. Though their number is
rather small, they are making strenuous efforts to spread their views among the people. It will
be a calamity for the Church, which is considered to be the most evangelistic and progressive
of all oriental churches to give up the open Bible, its character of liberty and the full Gospel to
cold formalism and spiritual indifference.

The concerted endeavours of the anti-reformists group to shake the evangelical faith and doctrines
of the Mar Thoma church yielded results. Bishop Abraham passed away in 1947 and Bishop John
was installed as the Metropolitan Juhanon Mar Thoma. With the influence and support of Juhanon
Mar Thoma, the anti reformists got an upper hand in the church.

The anti-reformists declared that the reformation was quite unnecessary and wrong. They
said the basis for all doctrines and practices were not Bible alone, but also the Nicene Creed, the
traditions of the church, the writings of the fathers, the orders of worship services (liturgy) and the
circulars of the Metropolitan. They even questioned the inspiration of the Bible. It was said that
there is a kind of presence of Christ in the bread and wine of the Holy communion when the minister
offers the prayer (when he pronounces the epiclesis). Thus Juhanon Mar Thoma Metropolitan
introduced a “duel emphasis” theory regarding the Holy Communion. He also held the view that
prayer for the dead is not unspiritual, even if it is not in the orders of service. Contradicting to the
teachings of the reformers and the religious feelings of those who stood in that line, the
Metropolitan even went to offer a prayer for some dead at a private worship at Kottayam. And
methodically the church hierarchy pressurised individual parishes to introduce the use of rituals,
candles, crosses, censors etc, where those had never been practiced. The public utterance he made
in Madras soon after he took the office as the Metropolitan that he had become the Metropolitan of
Mar Thoma church to liquidate it, shocked the entire Church. The Episcopal election of 1952 proved
that the anti-reformist movement was gaining strength within the Church.

Origin of STECI

The view of the Metropolitan and his associates and their activities against the reformation
principles of Abraham Malpan caused a major section of people in the church to unite and resist
those anti evangelical tendencies. This led to the formation of the Mar Thoma Pathiopadesa
Samathy (Association for the preservation of the sound doctrines of the Mar Thoma Church) on 29th
October 1952. K N Daniel, one of the foremost lay leaders of the Mar Thoma church, theologian,
author of many books and a church historian was the leader of the Pathiopadesa Samathy. They
strongly resisted the attempt of the church hierarchy for roughly Ten years. The attempts for peace
between the reformation party and the church leadership were made by Earnest efforts of eminent
men and commissions (Dr. Stanly Jones, a group of clergy, the Bishop’s commission of Church of
South India etc) became a failure. The immediate cause for the formation of STECI was due to the
suspension and later excommunication of four Presbyters (Rev. P. John Varghese, Rev. P.I. Mathai,
Rev. C.M. Vaghese, Rev. K.O John) from Mar Thoma Church for their evangelical stand.

Eventually, the leaders of the patheyopadesa Samithy, the representatives of the fellowship of
clergy, Trivandrum Fellowship and North Travancore Fellowship met at Kuttalam and decided to
come out of Mar Thoma Church. The decision was very costly and painful for safe guarding the
evangelical faith by leaving the church buildings, seminaries, colleges, schools and other institutions
in the Mar Thoma Church.

All the evangelicals were summoned to Kumbanadu on Dec 31st 1960 to work out the further course
of action and unanimously took a decision to inaugurate St. Thomas Evangelical Church of India on
January 26, 1961.

As per the decision, Twenty ministers and about 25000 laity assembled at a place called Thymala
near Tiruvalla on January 26, 1961 and formally declared the formation of St. Thomas Evangelical
Church of India. They consecrated Rev. John Varghese and Rev. K. N. Oommen as the Bishops of the
Church. The Bishops were consecrated by the laying of hands of the entire body of Presbyters
representing the whole church. The leaders of the new church explained the laying of the hands of
the Presbyters in the consecration of the Bishops with the historical examples from the practices of
the Pre-Constantine church. The first guidance and support for this practice was received from the
practices of the New Testament church (Acts 9: 11-12; 15-18; 13: 1-3; Romans 10: 15; 1Timothy
4:14).
Growth of St. Thomas Evangelical Church of India

The STECI was formed for the three fundamental principles of safeguarding the sound
doctrine based on the 66 books (New and the Old Testaments) of the Bible, living out an
evangelical lifestyle according to the standards of the Bible and for obeying the great
commission of the Jesus Christ by evangelizing India. When the church was formally
launched all believers stood up and raised their right hands and took a pledge that they and
their children would stand for the Gospel. At the time of its very inception itself, STECI has
laid down the policy to be followed in its dealing with other Christian Churches in the Joint
kalpana (commandment or circular) No 1 dated 20-3-1961 issued by its two Bishops. Para 3
of the circular reads as follow:-

We have constituted ourselves with an all India vision, as an Episcopal and Evangelical
Church, on the basis of the New Testament. We recognize all sections of the Universal
Church and will co-operate with all the faithful who are partakers in the free salvation secured
by Jesus Christ and who truly love Him and are striving to be witnesses to the Gospel of His
grace and will work in the spirit of Christ as a church to attain to this supreme end ‘to gather
in one all things in Jesus Christ’. With malice towards none, with charity for all, with
firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us complete the task we are engaged
in.

STECI is still open to new ideas, thoughts and even developments happened in the universal
church which is not against the principles of the Bible.
The hostile attitude taken by the mother church increased the hardships of the
infant church. Mar Thomites were prohibited by their church leadership from selling their
lands to the new church for the construction of church buildings. The Mar Thoma
Metropolitan issued his kalpana (circular) No 156 dated 14th February 1961, which was
printed in large numbers and sent not only to the parishes and every members of the Mar
Thoma church, but also to other sister churches by using his authority as one of the presidents
of the WCC and Christ’s Vicar on earth. In this circular he has prohibited the issue of letters
for publishing banns for marriage to the Evangelical Church, the publication of banns of
marriage of couples any one of them being a member of that Church, the marriage of women
members of the Mar Thoma Church to members of the Evangelical Church and the partaking
in the services conducted by ministers of that Church. He also prohibits the members of the
Mar Thoma church from partaking or co-operating or even attending any worship or
sacraments conducted by its ministers and define such conduct as an offence involving
forfeiture of his membership in the Mar Thoma church and directs the Vicars in the church to
take prompt disciplinary actions against such members and to remove them from
membership. His main aim for doing all these activities was to destroy STECI in its inception
stage itself. The situation of the STECI at that time was something similar to the official
persecution of the early centuries.

In the initial years, the church members met in houses as early Christians did. But lack of
facilities and losing the benefits of being a part of a well established church did not dry out
the enthusiasm of the early believers of the church. Writing after ten months of the
inauguration of the church P T Thomas and P C Zachariah (two senior presbyters of that
time) give the following statistics:

We have formed nearly 200 congregations with a total membership of 25000, we have 2
Bishops, 20 ministers, 63 Evangelists and 150 church workers. We have constructed a
building for the Bible seminary and 40 church buildings, purchased sites for church buildings
in another 75 places and in 45 places church buildings are under construction. In 70 places
the people meet in sheds while in 86 places they meet in houses for worship. A sister church
has lent us one of its church buildings for our worship and in 3 places our people worship in
rented halls.

In the decade following the inauguration of the church, the church was able to acquire
properties in most of the places to construct church buildings and for cemeteries. People
stood firm for the growth of the church by resisting all hurdles including the strong
opposition and ridicule from the mother church.

However, the initial enthusiasm in the church did not last for long years. Internal struggles
and fighting started in the church in connection with the election of a Bishop. As a result, a
group of people went out of the church and started a new organization called the St Thomas
Evangelical Fellowship of India. The fellowship fraction tried to disturb the smooth
functioning of the church by filing court cases against the church. As a result of these
struggles, many left the church and joined other churches and some even went back to the
Mar Thoma church. Therefore, the era starting from 1970 till 1995 can be considered as the
dark ages in the history of STECI. During that period, Bishop Most. Rt. Rev. Dr. T.C.
Cherian was the Bishop of St. Thomas Evangelical Church of India and Bishop Most. Rev.
M. K. Koshy was the Bishop of St. Thomas Evangelical Fellowship of India.
Within those years, a major mile stone had happened in the church was that Jubilee Memorial
Bible College had been started in Sishyasram at Madras on 15th August 1987 as a silver
Jubilee Project of the Church, under the leadership of Vicar General Very Rev. P.T.
Chandapilla for preparing youths for evangelisation of India.
As a major step in evangelisation in the history of STECI, under the Board for Evangelistic
Work, Hindi Belt Mission Cell project had started its work in area of Hindi Belt on 1998.
Same time, members of STECI realized the importance of church standing together for cause
of evangelising India and glory of God. By the Grace of God, on 25th June 1995 a major group
of St. Thomas Evangelical Fellowship of India joined to the Church and conducted thanks
giving ceremony in the central chapel. On that occasion 15 candidates had been given
ordination and Most. Rev. M.K. koshy became presiding Bishop of the Church. As a result,
the court case against the church was withdrawn on March 12 th 2003, Prethinithi sabha was
conducted legally, and new office bearers had been elected in the church. However, by the
grace of God, after several discussions the entire group of St. Evangelical fellowship jointed
to the church without any condition on 2007.

Thereafter, STECI regained its strength, vision and commitments in safeguarding the
pure gospel and in reaching the unreached people groups in India. At present, the church
has 5 Bishops, 121 Presbyters and 248 Parishes. Our Presiding Bishop is Most Rev. Dr. C.V.
Mathew and Our Diocesan Bishop is Rt. Rev. Dr. Thomas Abraham. STECI is no more a Kerala
church, now it spread into 17 states of India. Also we have churches in America, Europe, and
Asian continents. In the beginning, STECI has only Malayalam worship services and now it
has worship services in English, Bengali, Chhathisgadi, Marathi, Tamil, Hindi, Gujarati, Oriya,
Kannada and Telugu languages. The entire church is divided into 7 Dioceses; Presiding
Bishop Most Rev. Dr. C. V. Mathew is responsible for the dioceses of East Kerala, North
America and Europe and Gulf and Singapore and Diocese Bishop Rt. Rev. Dr. Thomas
Abraham is responsible for the dioceses of South Kerala, west Kerala, North Kerala, and
Bahya Kerala.