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St Thomas Evangelical Church Of India
St. Thomas Evangelical Church of India (STECI) is an Oriental Protestant (Reformed Orthodox) episcopal denomination based in Kerala, India. It derives from a schism in the Malankara Mar Thoma Syrian Church in 1961 and forms a part of the Saint Thomas Syrian Christian community. The church is engaged in active witnessing and building up of faith communities that will witness the love of God and serving people around in need. The headquarters of the church is at Tiruvalla, Kerala. History The St. Thomas Evangelical Church is one of several groups of Saint Thomas Christians claiming origins to St. Thomas the Apostle who, according to their tradition, came to India in AD 52. While STECI is considered to be an episcopal church, it is also deeply influenced by evangelicalism. Until 1961, the church's history was deeply connected to the Malankara Mar Thoma Syrian Church, and South Indian Christianity's contact with Evangelical British missionaries during British colonial times ...
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Protestant Eastern Christianity
The term Eastern Protestant Christianity (or Eastern Reformed Christianity as well as Oriental Protestant Christianity) encompasses a range of heterogeneous Protestant Christian denominations that developed outside of the Occident, from the latter half of the nineteenth century, and yet keep elements of Eastern Christianity, to varying degrees. Some of these denominations came into being, when existing Protestant churches adopted reformational variants of Eastern and Oriental Orthodox liturgy and worship. Some others are the result of reformations of Orthodox beliefs and practices, inspired by the teachings of Western Protestant missionaries. Some Eastern Protestant Churches are in communion with similar Western Protestant Churches. However, Eastern Protestant Christianity does not constitute a single communion. This is due to the diverse polities, practices, liturgies and orientations of the denominations which fall under this category. List of churches * Armenian Evangelica ...
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Malankara Mar Thoma Syrian Church
The Malankara Mar Thoma Syrian Church, often shortened to Mar Thoma Church, and known also as the Reformed Syrian ChurchS. N. Sadasivan. A Social History of India'. APH Publishing; 2000. . p. 442. and the Mar Thoma Syrian Church of Malabar, is an autonomous Reformed Oriental church based in Kerala, India. While continuing many of the Syriac high church practices, the church is reformed in its theology and doctrines. It employs a reformed variant of the West Syriac Rite Divine Liturgy of Saint James, translated to Malayalam. The Mar Thoma Church sees itself as continuation of the Saint Thomas Christians, a community traditionally believed to have been founded in the first century by Thomas the Apostle, who is known as Mar Thoma (''Saint Thomas'') in Syriac,Mathew, K. S. (1993). ''The Faith and Practice of the Mar Thoma Church''. and describes itself as "Apostolic in origin, Universal in nature, Biblical in faith, Evangelical in principle, Ecumenical in outlook, Oriental ...
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Bishop P John Varughese
A bishop is an ordained clergy member who is entrusted with a position of Episcopal polity, authority and oversight in a religious institution. In Christianity, bishops are normally responsible for the governance of dioceses. The role or office of bishop is called episcopacy. Organizationally, several Christian denominations utilize ecclesiastical structures that call for the position of bishops, while other denominations have dispensed with this office, seeing it as a symbol of power. Bishops have also exercised political authority. Traditionally, bishops claim apostolic succession, a direct historical lineage dating back to the original Twelve Apostles or Saint Paul. The bishops are by doctrine understood as those who possess the full Priest#Christianity, priesthood given by Jesus in Christianity, Jesus Christ, and therefore may ordain other clergy, including other bishops. A person ordained as a deacon, priest (i.e. presbyter), and then bishop is understood to hold the fulln ...
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Bishop KN Oommen
A bishop is an ordained clergy member who is entrusted with a position of authority and oversight in a religious institution. In Christianity, bishops are normally responsible for the governance of dioceses. The role or office of bishop is called episcopacy. Organizationally, several Christian denominations utilize ecclesiastical structures that call for the position of bishops, while other denominations have dispensed with this office, seeing it as a symbol of power. Bishops have also exercised political authority. Traditionally, bishops claim apostolic succession, a direct historical lineage dating back to the original Twelve Apostles or Saint Paul. The bishops are by doctrine understood as those who possess the full priesthood given by Jesus Christ, and therefore may ordain other clergy, including other bishops. A person ordained as a deacon, priest (i.e. presbyter), and then bishop is understood to hold the fullness of the ministerial priesthood, given responsibility by ...
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Vernacular
A vernacular or vernacular language is in contrast with a "standard language". It refers to the language or dialect that is spoken by people that are inhabiting a particular country or region. The vernacular is typically the native language, normally spoken informally rather than written, and seen as of lower status than more codified forms. It may vary from more prestigious speech varieties in different ways, in that the vernacular can be a distinct stylistic register, a regional dialect, a sociolect, or an independent language. Vernacular is a term for a type of speech variety, generally used to refer to a local language or dialect, as distinct from what is seen as a standard language. The vernacular is contrasted with higher-prestige forms of language, such as national, literary, liturgical or scientific idiom, or a ''lingua franca'', used to facilitate communication across a large area. According to another definition, a vernacular is a language that has not develope ...
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Malayalam
Malayalam (; , ) is a Dravidian language spoken in the Indian state of Kerala and the union territories of Lakshadweep and Puducherry (Mahé district) by the Malayali people. It is one of 22 scheduled languages of India. Malayalam was designated a "Classical Language of India" in 2013. Malayalam has official language status in Kerala, and Puducherry ( Mahé), and is also the primary spoken language of Lakshadweep, and is spoken by 34 million people in India. Malayalam is also spoken by linguistic minorities in the neighbouring states; with significant number of speakers in the Kodagu and Dakshina Kannada districts of Karnataka, and Kanyakumari, district of Tamil Nadu. It is also spoken by the Malayali Diaspora worldwide, especially in the Persian Gulf countries, due to large populations of Malayali expatriates there. There are significant population in each cities in India including Mumbai, Bengaluru, Delhi, Kolkata, Pune etc. The origin of Malayalam remains a matter of ...
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Evangelicalism
Evangelicalism (), also called evangelical Christianity or evangelical Protestantism, is a worldwide interdenominational movement within Protestant Christianity that affirms the centrality of being " born again", in which an individual experiences personal conversion; the authority of the Bible as God's revelation to humanity (biblical inerrancy); and spreading the Christian message. The word ''evangelical'' comes from the Greek (''euangelion'') word for " good news". Its origins are usually traced to 1738, with various theological streams contributing to its foundation, including Pietism and Radical Pietism, Puritanism, Quakerism, Presbyterianism and Moravianism (in particular its bishop Nicolaus Zinzendorf and his community at Herrnhut).Brian Stiller, ''Evangelicals Around the World: A Global Handbook for the 21st Century'', Thomas Nelson, USA, 2015, pp. 28, 90. Preeminently, John Wesley and other early Methodists were at the root of sparking this new movement during the ...
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Episcopal Polity
An episcopal polity is a Hierarchy, hierarchical form of Ecclesiastical polity, church governance ("ecclesiastical polity") in which the chief local authorities are called bishops. (The word "bishop" derives, via the British Latin and Vulgar Latin term ''*ebiscopus''/''*biscopus'', from the Ancient Greek ''epískopos'' meaning "overseer".) It is the structure used by many of the major Christian Churches and Christian denomination, denominations, such as the Catholic, Eastern Orthodox Church, Eastern Orthodox, Oriental Orthodoxy, Oriental Orthodox, Church of the East, Anglicanism, Anglican, Lutheranism, Lutheran and Methodist churches or denominations, and other churches founded independently from these lineages. Churches with an episcopal polity are governed by bishops, practising their authorities in the dioceses and Episcopal Conference, conferences or synods. Their leadership is both sacramental and constitutional; as well as performing ordinations, confirmations, and cons ...
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Thomas (Apostle)
Thomas the Apostle ( arc, 𐡀𐡌𐡅𐡕𐡌, hbo, תוֹמא הקדוש or תוֹמָא שליחא (''Toma HaKadosh'' "Thomas the Holy" or ''Toma Shlikha'' "Thomas the Messenger/Apostle" in Hebrew-Aramaic), syc, ܬܐܘܡܐ, , meaning "twin"; grc-x-koine, Θωμᾶς),; cop, ⲑⲱⲙⲁⲥ; mal, തോമാ ശ്ലീഹാ also known as (Greek: Δίδυμος ''Didymos,'' meaning "twin"), was one of the Twelve Apostles of Jesus according to the New Testament. Thomas is commonly known as "Doubting Thomas" because he initially doubted the resurrection of Jesus Christ when he was told of it (as is related in the Gospel of John); he later confessed his faith ("My Lord and my God") on seeing the wounds left over from the crucifixion. According to traditional accounts of the Saint Thomas Christians of modern-day Kerala in India, Saint Thomas travelled outside the Roman Empire to preach the Gospel, travelling as far as the Tamilakam which is in South India, and reached ...
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Tiruvalla
Thiruvalla, alternately spelled Tiruvalla, is a town in Kerala and the Headquarters of the Taluk of the same name located in Pathanamthitta district in the State of Kerala, India. The town is spread over an area of . It lies on the banks of the Pambas and Manimala rivers, and is a land-locked region surrounded by irrigating streams and rivers.It is the largest town in the district and central Travancore. Thiruvalla is regarded as the "Land of Non resident Indians". It is the financial,educational,cultural and commercial capital of central travancore. Demographics The town spans a geographic area of with a population of 52,883 as of 2011, a decline from the 57,800 recorded in the previous census. Males constitute 48% of the population and females 52%. In Thiruvalla, 5% of the population is under 6 years of age. Etymology Tradition tells that the name Thiruvalla comes from the word "''Valla Vaay''", named after the river Manimala which was known as ''Vallayār'' in anci ...
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