P
Parumala Thirumeni.
Geevarghese Mar Gregorios died at Parumala in 1902, and people were coming to his tomb for healing within months. The Malankara church declared him a saint in 1947 — its own canonisation, of its own bishop, on its own authority, which was the point. The pilgrimage each November draws hundreds of thousands, Christian and not.
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Held by most — broad, but not universal
Thomas came here in 52.
The church holds that the apostle Thomas landed at Kodungallur in AD 52, founded seven and a half churches along the Malabar coast, and was killed at Mylapore near Madras in 68. The tradition is old and continuous in Kerala; outside historians treat the second-century Acts of Thomas as legend and the Indian Christian presence as securely attested from about the third century onward.
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Contested within — affirmed by some schools, refused by others
The Catholicos of the East sits in India.
The Catholicate was re-established at Niranam in 1912 and the church has governed itself under its own constitution since 1934. The Jacobite Syrian Christian Church contests exactly this: it holds that the Patriarch of Antioch retains authority over the Malankara church, and Indian courts have been deciding between the two positions since the nineteenth century.
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Cosmos & Afterlife
how reality is built, and what follows deathThe nature of reality
Created and hallowed; Kerala's soil included, which is why the graves of its saints are pilgrimage sites.
After death
Resurrection and judgment; the dead are prayed for by name and the tombs of holy bishops are visited.