The Synod of the Syro-Malabar Church has elected priest Thomas Animoottil as the new auxiliary bishop of the archeparchy of Kottayam, in the state of Kerala, India. Pope Leo XIV had previously granted his assent to the election and has assigned him the titular see of Troina, according to a report issued this Thursday, August 27, by the Holy See Press Office.
Animoottil, 64, belongs to the clergy of the archeparchy itself and since 2025 has served as pro-protosyncellus —a position equivalent to that of a vicar general— of Kottayam.
Who are the Syro-Malabar Catholics
The Syro-Malabar Church is in full communion with Rome and recognizes the Pope as head of the universal Church, but it does not belong to the Latin Church. It is one of the 23 Eastern Catholic Churches sui iuris, with its own hierarchy, discipline, and liturgical tradition.
Its historical heartland is in Kerala, in southern India, and its faithful belong to the ancient tradition of the so-called St. Thomas Christians, whose evangelization of the region is traced back to the Apostle St. Thomas in the first century.
Its liturgy belongs to the East Syriac tradition, historically linked to the ancient Christian communities of Mesopotamia and Persia. The Syro-Malabars are therefore fully Catholic, yet they preserve a liturgical, spiritual, and disciplinary heritage distinct from the Roman rite.
Kottayam and the Knanaya Catholics
The archeparchy of Kottayam also has a distinctive feature within the Syro-Malabar Church due to its close connection with the Knanaya, an ancient community of St. Thomas Christians that maintains its own historical identity.
Knanaya tradition places its origins in the arrival on the coast of Kerala, in the fourth century, of a group of Christians from the Near East led by Thomas of Cana. Over the centuries they maintained a marked communal identity within St. Thomas Christianity.
Kottayam constitutes the principal ecclesiastical center of this community. The archeparchy primarily serves Knanaya faithful of the Syro-Malabar tradition and also Knanaya faithful belonging to the Syro-Malankara tradition.
Animoottil is likewise familiar with the diaspora of this community. Between 2003 and 2008 he carried out his pastoral ministry in the United States within the Syro-Malabar Eparchy of St. Thomas the Apostle of Chicago.
Canonist trained in Rome
Thomas Animoottil was born on January 13, 1962, in Payyavoor, in Kerala. After completing his schooling in his hometown and his university studies in Mysore, he began his priestly formation at the minor seminary St. Stanislaus in Kottayam.
He studied Philosophy and Theology at St. Joseph’s Seminary in Mangalore and was ordained a priest on April 13, 1989. He was later sent to Rome, where in 1993 he obtained a licentiate in Canon Law from the Pontifical University of the Holy Cross.
During his more than 37 years of priesthood he has held various responsibilities in the archeparchy of Kottayam. He has served as pastor of Pulinjal, secretary to the eparchial bishop, chancellor, secretary of the Pastoral Council, ecclesiastical advisor to the Catholic Nurses Guild of India, and vicar forane —or protopresbyter of the deanery— of Uzhavoor and Kaduthuruthy.
Since 2025 he has served as pro-protosyncellus of the archeparchy. As the new auxiliary bishop he will collaborate with Mar Mathew Moolakkatt, Metropolitan Archbishop of Kottayam.