Felix Wilfred wrote about the crisis that the priests and faithful of the archdiocese of Ernakulam-Angamaly face: “At the very least, there should be what the great Cardinal John Henry Newman referred to as the ‘consulting of the faithful’, in the profound sense of ‘consult’ that he intended. This cannot be something optional, but something to be woven into the structure and functioning of the Oriental Synods. This would require suitable canonical amendments.” Facing the altar for the Eucharistic part of the Holy Mass may appear to be a trivial problem. But it was a crisis that involved not only the Major Archbishop but also the entire Synod of bishops and the Vatican. It was for more than 450 priests and people of God a Way of the Cross extending to almost four years. It was in defence of the very faith and morality of the church. It started off as a land deal scam to the tune of 20 crores of rupees involving the Major Archbishop. The archdiocese was fined six crores of rupees because of it by the Income Tax Department. Two commissions of enquiry submitted their reports to the Vatican. The Pope removed the major archbishop from administration of the archdiocese and directed that restitution be paid to the archdiocese for the loss incurred. Strangely, the Syro-Malabar Synod of bishops took the stand that the major Archbishop had committed no wrong. One archbishop even said, “there is nothing unethical about it, it is what everybody does.” All attempts for an amicable settlement failed.
Meanwhile, the synod of bishops enacted without the stipulated synodal consultation a uniform mode of 50-50 formula for the celebration of the Holy Mass. That formula was proposed in 1990 and withdrawn in the face of protests. At least three eparchies protested both before and after the enactment. The protests that erupted after the latest enactment were ignored. A Papal letter of request to implement the decision, which smacked of a de facto misrepresentation, was also brought in to smother the protests. The priests and people of the Ernakulam archdiocese refused to implement the 50-50 formula, because they saw it as an attempt to punish the whistle-blowers of the land deal scandal and to isolate the archdiocese by diverting the attention of the other dioceses from the murky land deal. It was an extremely shrewd move. The archdiocese was subjected to many compulsions and canonical pressures. Two bishops were unceremoniously removed from office and an archbishop was compelled to resign. Resistance by the priests and laity of the archdiocese continued despite the Pope writing a letter to the archdiocese to comply with the Synodal formula of mass. Then the Pope send a delegate to sort out the issue. He made the unilateral move of imposing the synod decision on the archdiocese, but he failed.
AS a prelude to his second visit, both the papal administrator of the archdiocese and the Major Archbishop were removed. This time around, he adopted a consultative approach. He met the priests and lay people in groups. That proved quite fruitful. He responded positively to the agreement arrived at between the priests of the archdiocese and a group of bishops who were tasked with finding a solution to the impasse. But he went back leaving the issue in limbo. It was a case of Hegelian dialectics spewing out destructive Manichean or Gnostic dualism. A tragic state of affairs ensued, as Romano Guardini wrote, “By a pair of fundamental and imposing impulses, a willing to exist, to assert, to develop…. and to perish.” Guardini maintains that the polar opposites in life are not to be avoided but to be regarded as necessary for creative tension. So we are not dealing here with notions of Hegelian dialectics being resolved in higher syntheses or the Jungian notion of the Coincidentia Oppositorum being resolved in the transcendent function. The experience of the tension of polar opposites is clearly evident here. The contradictions can and should be resolved in people’s consciousness using the grammar of ethics and spirituality. Evil is that which opposes our ability to create; good is that which is enhanced and developed by our creativity. As Kierkegaard criticises Hegelian philosophy, which culminates in the thesis. the outer is the inner and the inner is the outer. Hegelian dialectics of war is objectification and alienation of interior life without having anything to do with the ethical or the spiritual. God is the interior power of transforming the world and man, while evil limits or prevents such metamorphosis. That was the sad history of a particular church and a lesson for all.