Bp Tony Neelankavil, Trichur

What will you choose as your episcopal motto?
To truine God and to His people.

What is so special about that sentence?
I think it reflects my priestly ministry as well as my studies. When I look back on my priestly ministry I see that my study has very much influenced it. In my seminary days, I was interested in the theology of the Trinity. I did my bachelor degree and masters paper on Spirit Christology. The emphasis is not only on the vision of God but also on how the vision of God influences our vision of the society as a community, and therefore my interests are very well reflected in this liturgical text. For my doctorate I continued in Trinitarian theology as a way of doing theology in dialogue with the Indian culture.

Trinity is some sort communion, the call to unity as against individualistic isolation. Communion is what you wish to create in the society, aren’t you?
Exactly, so the more you reflect on the Trinity the more you become aware of an ideal society. Because God is not an isolated being. We read in the Gospel of John “God is love.” Love cannot exist in isolation, it is sharing in communion. Our God is sharing, He is communion. When we reflect on human realities we cannot think in isolation, we cannot think of ourselves as islands. Without relationships human life has no meaning.

If you look at the Acts of the Apostles, the first Christian communities held all property in common. Similarly, the entire universe is for the human community, not for anybody’s private ownership. Does not Christian renunciation of private property have its beginning in the Acts of the Apostles?
The Acts of the Apostles is still relevant and I think it should take various forms in response to the present needs of the day, because now we may not be able to be simply the clones of the early primitive community; we live in a wider society. We need to be the light of the world and the salt of the earth. That’s the way the Christian vision of God really becomes a spirituality that helps us to realize the culture of sharing.

The coenobitic communities truly renounced private property and owned everything in common as Marx said, “From everyone according to his capability and to everyone according to his need is.” Is that dying out, threatening the relevance of religious life?
On the contrary, there is greater relevance of religious communities today, and I think these religious communities need to go back to the radical Christian life, radical communion, and the wider community should be able to look at them as an inspiration to lead a Christian life of sharing in its own way. The problem comes when we try to swim with the world current unaware of our identity. It occurs in all forms of consecrated life, and in family life too.

Do you notice a withering away of the consecrated life?
Yeah, some religious communities are not aware of this danger. But I can tell you that there are several new initiatives taking place. For example, the Clarist Congregation has decided to have extension centres where they simply forget all the protection of the religious house. They live in ordinary houses just like others. They live the religious life within the wider community. They have a lot of freedom to live their celibate religious shared life not only among themselves but also in the wider community, and that is very well appreciated by the people. They get more and more convinced of their religious vocation and relevance in those extraordinary situations. Such experiments will certainly revive the religious communities. This attitude should seep into the very structure of religious communities.

In other words, you are thinking of new forms?
Yes, new forms within religious communities will correct very narrow understanding of charisms, which were formed centuries back. If religious communities fail to respond to the needs of the time, using charisms as excuse, I think they will cease to have any relevance in the future. Charisms should encounter everyday realities of the people and the society.

As the Auxiliary Bishop of Thrissur, how big a task is awaiting you?
We have almost four lakhs Catholics, 397 priests and around 230 parishes to look after.

What will be your priority as you assist your archbishop?
I may not dare to set my own priorities, because I am assisting my archbishop. But I think I will be able to contribute in certain areas like priestly formation. I was mostly involved in priestly formation. I have also been involved in the ongoing formation of priests from 2014 onwards together with Fr E.J. Thomas. We introduced a research institute in Mary Matha seminary which is known as Pastoral Animation Research and Outreach Centre. There we initiated a research that will be conducted mainly in the parishes. So our focus at present is mainly on the parishes. There we try to train parishioners in sociological tools and try to see how they can use them to identify the needs of the people and then how to analyse those needs to set out our pastoral goals in response. We have been doing that in 40 parishes. Which means I was engaged with these parishes for at least a period of four to five months. Our initiative was a great eye opener for the parishioners. It was also a great learning process for me and for all of us in the institute, may be, that is an area where I will be able to contribute as an auxiliary bishop.

What is the main strength of the Thrissur Archdiocese?
I think the biggest strength of the archdiocese is the active participation of the people of God. We have a very large number of active faithful. We used to develop a participatory pastoral ministry in which the lay people are not just advisers, they identify the needs, they analyse those needs together with their parish priest and religious as a team and become the shepherds of the parish. Shepherding each other, as Pope Benedict says, is the future of the pastoral ministry. The parish priests need not be overburdened with their ministries; rather, they should work in collaboration with parish teams. That will help them to respond to the needs of the people, making the pastoral ministry and the Church relevant to the people.

Do you visualise some sort of a deconstruction of the system?
I don’t see deconstruction as a starting point. The Word sprouts, it grows and it bears fruit. We only sow the seed, see the green of the new life. We don’t do all the work, the Lord does the work. It grows spontaneously. Then the Church will have a new flavour.

What according to you is now the weakness of the Church?
I think the weakness of the Church is its structure and institutions. Starting a school, for example, is not something we should be doing today. We are now carrying over a great burden from the past, from many decades and centuries, which gives us a very comfortable position. This helps the priests, the bishops and the religious to create their own comfort zone very easily. But I feel that cannot survive long, that cannot help us to survive as the Church in the face of present challenges.

Do you see some sort of resistance to change?
I think it is not consciously happening, but it is existing out there. Because we are very much at ease with our comfort zones, a change always turns out to be painful. Who will initiate the change? I think it should first and foremost be the work of the Holy Spirit. We can be His instruments by sowing the seeds of the Word of God. Together we build up the Kingdom of God. I think, if we are able to start somewhere, the Spirit will certainly guide and help us.

What about your family?
My father, Chevalier N.A. Ouseph Neelankavil, retired as a college professor, but teaching was for him a secondary profession. He always considered his participation as a lay minister in the Church as his priority. I got my inspiration from his life. He has been perhaps my most important formator in Christian life. My mother is a great lady who prays a lot. Both of them studied theology prior to the Second Vatican Council through the first theology course for the laity organized in the Aluva seminary by Fr Constantine Manalel, who started Jeevadhara. I have a sister and three brothers.

You have a very famous father, a great lay leader of the Catholic Church. What have you learned from him?
First of all I learned to give priority to my faith over everything else. As children, we didn’t get him often, but then he always said that his priority was the Church. He used to say that God would always supplement what is lacking. Another very important thing I learned from him is his understanding of lay leadership in the Church. I think all his life he called for lay participation. He is a product of the Second Vatican Council, which gave him the notion of the Church as the people of God, and therefore he always fought for lay participation in the Church, not simply as people who are called to pray, pay and obey, but also as people who should take up leadership in the Church. That has always been a challenge before me in my priestly ministry.

The last question; why do you pray and what is prayer for you?
Now I pray for fulfilling my responsibility in the new ministry to which I am called. It is not very easy for me to take up the challenges ahead of me as a bishop in the wider society, where we are facing many challenges. Another prayerful question in my mind is how to tackle the fundamentalist attitudes growing culturally in the Church. It is something about which I am really worried. I really need God’s grace and so I pray that I will be able to fulfil what God has entrusted me with and what the people of God also expect from me. I listen to the Spirit living in the people of God. I think I need to get prepared to receive those gifts of the Holy Spirit to fulfill my ministry.