The Malankara Church, also known as Puthenkur, is the historic unified body of West Syriac Saint Thomas Christian denominations which claim ultimate origins from the missions of Thomas the Apostle. This community, under the leadership of Thoma I, opposed the Padroado Jesuits as well as the Propaganda Carmelites of the Latin Church, following the historical Coonan Cross Oath of 1653. The Malankara Church's divisions and branchings have resulted in present-day Churches that include the Jacobite Syrian Christian Church, the Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church, the Malankara Mar Thoma Syrian Church, the Malabar Independent Syrian Church, the Syro-Malankara Catholic Church, the Saint Thomas Anglicans of the Church of South India and the St. Thomas Evangelical Church of India.
Malankara Church
Thoma III, 3rd Malankara Metropolitan
Mor Osthatheos Sleebo
Kottayam Cheriapally, 1835 pencil drawing
The West Syriac Rite, also called the Syro-Antiochian Rite and the West Syrian Rite, is an Eastern Christian liturgical rite that employs the Divine Liturgy of Saint James in the West Syriac dialect. It is practised in the Maronite Church, the Syriac Orthodox Church, the Syriac Catholic Church and various Malankara Churches of India. It is one of two main liturgical rites of Syriac Christianity, the other being the East Syriac Rite.
It originated in the ancient Patriarchate of Antioch. It has more anaphoras than any other rite.
Holy Qurobo in the Maronite Church
A West Syriac Rite Holy Qurbono of the Jacobite Syrian Christian Church holding paterissa (crozier)
A West Syriac Rite Holy Qurbono of the Malankara Orthodox Syrian Church
Holy Qurobo in the Syro-Malankara Catholic Church