KOTTAYAM: Bishop Mar Thomas Thenatt, of Gwalior archdiocese, passed away due to complications arising from the injuries suffered in an accident on Saturday. The 65-year-old bishop was returning to the Bishop House after participating in a function held at a school belonging to the archdiocese on Friday night when he met with an accident. He suffered serious injuries and was rushed to a nearby hospital immediately. He was later shifted to St Joseph Hospital in Gwalior, but his life couldn’t be saved.
He belonged to Kottayam Archdiocese and was a parishioner of Ettumanoor St Joseph Church. Mar Thomas Thenatt was ordained a priest on October 21, 1978. He was appointed the Gwalior bishop by Pope Francis on October 18, 2017.
He was the first prelate from the Society of the Catholic Apostolate, popularly known as Pallotines, to become a bishop in India. Earlier, he had served in a parish in Jhabua diocese from 2008 to 2012 and subsequently he was the parish priest at Mankapur in Nagpur.
Mar Thenatt was born in a family of six on November 26, 1953, at Koodallor under the Archdiocese of Kottayam. After matriculation in 1969, he joined the Pallotine Minor Seminary in Thiruvananthapuram.
He returned to Nagpur to continue his theological studies and was ordained a priest in 1978. He obtained a masters degree in pastoral theology from Papal Seminary, Pune.
He began his priestly duties as an assistant parish priest at St Vincent Pallotti Parish of Amravati in Guntur diocese for a year in 1979. He served as the parish priest of St Antony Church, Mudfort, under Hyderabad archdiocese, for three years from 1984. He then served as the secretary of the archdiocesan commissions of youth and family and laity.