THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The mortal remains of Archbishop Geevarghese Mar Ivanios, the founder of the Syro-Malankara Catholic Church, will be exhumed on Monday as part of the cause of Canonisation.
The ceremony will start at 6.15 am with special prayers offered by Cardinal Mar Baselios Cleemis and all the bishops of the Syro-Malankara Catholic Church. The opening of the crypt, situated at the St Mary’s Cathedral, Pattom, will be supervised by a 21-member team which includes three specialist doctors and three assisting doctors, an architect, an apostolic delegate, a photographer, a videographer and other experts.
‘’These processes have been clearly laid down by the Vatican. The mortal remains are being exhumed as part of the Cause of Canonisation. This is to identify the remains as belonging to the individual in question,’’ Fr Bovas Mathew Meloottu, spokesperson of the church, said. The District Collector has given approval for the exhumation after an inspection was conducted by the RDO and police officials on Wednesday, church officials said.
On Monday morning, the tomb will be opened after various documents relating to the process are read out. Samuel Mannil Ramban and Fr Augustine Kailath, who had witnessed the burial of Mar Ivanios, will give their testimony on the occasion.
The mortal remains will be examined by doctors George Andrews, Nelson Chandy and Abraham Varghese Vattasseril. The mortal remains will be then kept in a special casket at the chapel. At 6 pm on Monday, the mortal remains will again be buried in a specially-constructed tomb under the supervision of Cardinal Cleemis.
Considered as the architect of the Reunion Movement, Mar Ivanios, then a bishop of the Syro-Malankara Orthodox Church, achieved communion with the Catholic Church in 1930. He died in July 1953, aged 70.