ALAPPUZHA: The standoff between the Jacobite Syrian Church and Malankara Orthodox Church, at Kattachira near Kayamkulam, which has delayed the funeral of a 94-year-old parishioner of the St Mary’s Church (Orthodox), has become a law and order issue.
The body of Varghese Mathew of Pallikkalethu was kept in his house in a mobile mortuary for the past eight days after the police and the district administration prevented to conduct the funeral ceremony in the church cemetery.
The officers said that the Supreme Court issued an order preventing the entry of priest from the Jacobite faction in the church. However, the believers from the Jacobite faction are demanding the entry of priest for the funeral rites and it led to the declaration of 144 by the District Collector in the locality for the past few days.
Varghese Mathew died on November 3. But the Orthodox faction did not allow to conduct his last rites at the church after they put a condition that Fr Georgy John, grandson of the deceased, a priest, shouldn’t attend the funeral service wearing a cassock.But, relatives of the deceased, who are from the Jacobite faction, have rejected the condition, and has resulted in uncertainty shrouding the funeral.
They kept the body on the road for a full day on November 8 and later shifted it to his house and is being kept there in a mobile mortuary unit since then. Though the District Collector had convened a reconciliatory meeting of the two factions, it turned futile.
Fr Roy George, vicar of the Jacobite faction said, the Supreme Court order never mentioned about the entry of priests in funeral rites without a cassock. “The Orthodox faction is preventing Fr Georgy John, grandson of the deceased person from conducting the rites.
“The police and district administration succumbed to the pressure of the faction. The church is under our ownership since past many decades and over 95 per cent of believers are from our faction,” he said.