ST. THOMAS DAY(JULY 3)

ST THOMAS DAY

(July 3^rd)

 

      July 3rd has been the feast day for St Thomas for many centuries December 21st was given as a feast day to Thomas for no significant historical reason throughout the Middle Ages undoubtedly to divert attention from the pagan rites associated with the day. When 16th century European priests arrived in southern India to introduce Christianity, they were told that a more famed Christian missionary had been there first. In the districts of Travancore and Cochin, there was already a community of Indian Christians with a tradition of loose communion with the Roman Catholic Church. The man who first converted them, the Indians said, was none other than St. Thomas the Apostle (the "Doubting Thomas"), who reputedly arrived in India aboard a Roman trading vessel in 52 A.D.

Whether St. Thomas actually preached under the palm trees of Travancore and Cochin is a point that historians have neither proved nor disproved. But nowadays there are 2,357,000 Indian Christians in the area, and for the past month, giving St. Thomas the benefit of the doubt, they have been celebrating the 1900th anniversary of his landing. Three Drops of Honey. According to tradition, St. Thomas made his first conversions by a miracle. At the village of Palur, he found some Brahman priests throwing handfuls of water into the air as they performed their purification prayers. Thomas threw some water into the air himself, and it hung suspended in the form of sparkling flowers. Tradition continues that most of the Brahmans embraced Christianity on the spot, and that the rest fled. To this day, no orthodox Brahman will take a bath in Palur.  Although St. Thomas was later killed (one legend says he was pierced by spears), the religion founded by him or later missionaries took firm hold. By the sixth century there were Indian churches in contact with the Christian bishops of Syria. In 883, King Alfred the Great sent an English bishop to make an offering for him at St. Thomas' shrine in Mylapore. But contact with the West was precarious, and by the end of the Middle Ages the Indian church was practically forgotten.

      In their isolation, the Indians developed surprisingly few originalities of dogma. But they did intersperse their religious rites with local Hindu practices. Like Hindus, Indian Christian women have always worn large gold earrings in the upper part of their ears. The Christians preserve Hindu-style observances for birth, marriage and death, e.g., when a child is born, its father pours into its mouth three drops of honey in which gold has been dipped. Festive Coconuts. The Portuguese, during their rule in India, tried to stamp out native Christian practices and enforce strict conformity to Latin rituals. In reaction, many Indian Christians broke away from Rome. Called "Jacobites," after Jacob al-Baradai, a 6th century Syrian bishop, they now number 800,000. Another group, the St. Thomas Christians (membership: 200,000), broke away in turn from the Jacobites, under Protestant influence, in 1837. About 1,000,000 "Romo-Syrians" have remained faithful to the Roman Catholic Church, although they use Syriac and their native language in their liturgy.  St. Thomas was a Jew, called to be one of the twelve Apostles. He was a dedicated but impetuous follower of Christ. When Jesus said He was returning to Judea  to visit His sick friend Lazarus, Thomas immediately exhorted the other Apostles  to accompany Him on the trip which involved certain danger and possible death because of the mounting hostility of the authorities. At the Last Supper, when Christ told His Apostles  that He was going to prepare a place for them to which they also might come because they knew both the place and the way, Thomas pleaded that they did not understand and received the beautiful assurance that  Christ is the Way, the Truth, and the Life. But St.Thomas is best known for his role in verifying the Resurrection of his Master. Thomas' unwillingness to believe that the other Apostles had seen their risen Lord on the first Easter Sunday merited for him the title of "doubting Thomas." Eight days later, on Christ's second apparition, Thomas was gently rebuked for his secptism  and furnished with the evidence he had demanded - seeing in Christ's hands the point of the nails and putting his fingers in the place of the nails and his hand into His side. At this, St. Thomas became convinced of the truth of the Resurrection and exclaimed: "My Lord and My God," thus making a public Profession of Faith in the Divinity of Jesus.  St. Thomas is also mentioned as being present at another Resurrection appearance of Jesus - at Lake Tiberias when a miraculous catch of fish occurred. This is all that we know about .St Thomas from the New Testament. Tradition says that at the dispersal of the Apostles after Pentecost this saint was sent to evangelize the Parthians, Medes, and Persians; he ultimately reached India, carrying the Faith to the Mlabar coast, which still boasts a large native population calling themselves "Christians of St. Thomas." He capped his left by shedding his blood for his Master, speared to death at a place called Calamine. His feast day is July 3rd.

                                                                                     Prof. John Kurakar