A civil court forces the Archeparchy of Kottayam not to exclude members who marry outside of their community. The rigid and contentious rule sought to safeguard the ethnic identity of a group that traces its origins back to 72 Jewish Christian families who migrated from Mesopotamia to modern-day India 17 centuries ago.
New Delhi (AsiaNews/Agencies) – For the first time a parish in the Archeparchy of Kottayam, Kerala has officially authorised a marriage of one of its members with a woman outside the Knanaya community, ending a very strict and contentious rule of endogamy that has lasted for 17 centuries and even excluded Catholics from other communities.
The parish priest of St Anne's Knanaya Church in the village of Kottody is allowing the wedding after the High Court of Kerala in March rejected a petition by the archdiocese against a 2021 civil court order that ruled as "illegal" the practice of expelling Church members who do not marry within the Knanaya community.
By virtue of this very rigid rule, aimed at safeguarding a specific ethnoreligious identity, thousands of people married in other dioceses or abroad found themselves excluded from their community.
For a long time, the Congregation for the Eastern Churches has called for an end to this form of endogamy, but until civil courts could rule on the matter following petitions by church members, the Archdiocese of Kottayam refused to yield.
Now, the parish priest gave Justin John, an autorickshaw driver, a letter of permission (kalyana kuri) to marry Vijimol Shaji. The wedding is scheduled for mid-May at the St Francis Xavier Church in Kottody, which falls under the jurisdiction of the Archdiocese of Tellicherry.
“I am happy that now I will not lose my membership from the Church,” the future groom told Matters India, an online news outlet.
The letter arrived just two days before the official engagement. “Somebody had tried to dissuade my bride’s family” so that they would “call off the marriage, but they did not succumb to such pressure,” John explained.
The Knanaya community traces its origins to a group of Jewish Christian migrants from Mesopotamia. According to tradition, some 72 families landed on the coasts of Kerala in the year AD 345.
They claim to have maintained the “purity” of their own blood via endogamy.
In its last appeal to the High Court of Kerala, cited by Matters India, the archdiocese expressed fears that, “The decision, if enforced, will destroy the ethnic identity of the community” and cause “great discontentment”.