The Syro-Malabar Catholic Church[16] (Syriac: ‫ )ܥ ܸܕܬ ܵܐ ܩܵܬܘܿܠܝܼܩܝܼ ܕܡܲܠܲܒܵܪ ܣܘܼܪܝܵܝܵܐ‬is an Eastern

Catholic church based in Kerala, India. The Syro-Malabar Church is an autonomous (sui iuris)
particular church in full communion with the pope and the worldwide Catholic Church,
including the Latin Church and the 22 other Eastern Catholic churches, with self-governance
under the Code of Canons of the Eastern Churches (CCEO). The Church is headed by the Major
Archbishop of the Syro-Malabar, currently George Alencherry. The Syro-Malabar Synod of
Bishops canonically convoked and presided over by the Major Archbishop constitutes the
supreme authority of the Church. The Major Archiepiscopal Curia of the Church is based in
Kakkanad, Kochi.[17] Syro-Malabar is a prefix reflecting the church's use of the East Syriac Rite
liturgy and origins in Malabar (modern Kerala). The name has been in usage in official Vatican
documents since the nineteenth century.[18]

The Syro-Malabar Church is primarily based in India; with 5 metropolitan archeparchies and 10
suffragan eparchies in Kerala, there are 17 eparchies in other parts of India, and 4 eparchies
outside India. It is the largest of the Saint Thomas Christians communities with a population of
2.35 million in Kerala as per the 2011 Kerala state census[14] and 4.25 million worldwide as
estimated in the 2016 Annuario Pontificio.[13] It is the third largest sui juris church in the
Catholic Church communion and the second largest Eastern Catholic church after the Ukrainian
Greek Catholic Church.[19]

The church traces its origins to the evangelistic activity of Thomas the Apostle in the 1st
century.[20][21][22][23] The earliest recorded organised Christian presence in India dates to
the 4th century, when Persian missionaries of the East Syriac Rite tradition, members of what
later became the Church of the East, established themselves in modern-day Kerala and Sri
Lanka.[24][25][26][27] The Church of the East shared communion within the Great Church
until the Council of Ephesus in the 5th century, separating primarily over differences in
Christology and due to political reasons. The Syro-Malabar Church employs a variant of the
East Syriac Rite, which dates back to 3rd century Edessa, Upper Mesopotamia.[28] As such it is
a part of Syriac Christianity by liturgy and heritage.[29]

After the schism of 1552, a faction of the Church of the East came in communion with the Holy
See of Rome (modern-day Chaldean Catholic Church) and the Church of the East collapsed due
to internal struggles. Throughout the later half of the 16th century, the Malabar Church was
under Chaldean Catholic jurisdiction. Through the Synod of Diamper of 1599, the Malabar
Church was subjected directly under the authority of the Latin Catholic Padroado
Archbishopric of Goa and the Jesuits. After a half-century administration under the Goa
Archdiocese, dissidents held the Coonan Cross Oath in 1653 as a protest. In response, Pope
Alexander VII, with the help of Carmelite missionaries, by 1662, was able to reunite the
majority of the dissidents with the Catholic Church. The Syro-Malabar Church descends from
the Saint Thomas Christians who first aligned with the Catholic Church at Synod of Diamper in
1599[30] and those who reunited with the Holy See under the leadership of Mar Palliveettil
Chandy during the period between 1655 and 1663.[31][32] During the 17th and 18th centuries
the Archdiocese of Cranganore was under the Syro-Malabar, but it was later suppressed and
integrated into the modern day Latin Archdiocese of Verapoly.
After over two centuries under the Latin Church's hegemony, in 1887, Pope Leo XIII fully
separated the Syro-Malabar from the Latin Church (the Archdiocese of Verapoly remained as
the jurisdiction for Latin Catholics). Leo XIII established two Apostolic Vicariates for Syro-
Malabar, Thrissur and Changanassery (originally named Kottayam), and in 1896, the Vicariate
of Ernakulam was erected as well, under the guidance of indigenous Syro-Malabar bishops. In
1923, the Syro-Malabar hierarchy was organized and unified with Ernakulam as the
Metropolitan See and Mar Augustine Kandathil as the first head and Archbishop of the Church.
[33] The Syro-Malabar Church in effect became an autonomous sui iuris Eastern church within
the Catholic communion.[34]