Some 300 Catholics demonstrated demanding the reopening of a cathedral in southern India on Jan. 26, more than a month after police closed it following a violent clash between rival Catholics over a longstanding liturgy dispute.
Police sealed the St Mary’s Cathedral Basilica in Ernakulam-Angamaly archdiocese in the Eastern rite Syro-Malabar Church in Kerala last Christmas eve.
The violence on the altar of the cathedral resulted in the desecration of consecrated holy host and wine and police had to intervene, church officials said.
“Our Church is closed and we have to go to nearby parishes for attending holy Mass and availing other sacraments,” says Thankachan Perayil, convener of Basilica Community, a group of cathedral parishioners, who protested.
Perayil blamed Archbishop Andrews Thazhath, apostolic administrator of the archdiocese, and Father Antony Poothavelil, administrator of the Cathedral, for the violence.
Archbishop Thazhath appointed the administrator after he faced a boycott by the majority of priests and faithful in the archdiocese due to his insistence on implementing the uniform mode of Mass in the archdiocese.
The parishioners and priests in the archdiocese want the Mass with celebrants facing the people, and they rejected the Church Synod-approved Mass, in which the celebrant faces the altar during Eucharistic prayer.