Alexander Thomas Kaliyanil

S.V.D. The Society of the Divine Word ( la, Societas Verbi Divini), abbreviated SVD and popularly called the Verbites or the Divine Word Missionaries, and sometimes the Steyler Missionaries, is a Catholic clerical religious congregation of Pontifical Ri ...

(born 27 May 1960) is an Indian Roman Catholic missionary and the current Archbishop of Bulawayo in Zimbabwe.

Biography

Born in

Vallachira Vallachira is a census town in Thrissur district in the Indian state of Kerala. Demographics India census, Vallachira had a population of 13,443. Males constitute 49% of the population and females 51%. Vallachira has an average literacy rate ...

, Kerala, Kaliyanil joined the Divine Word Missionaries in 1987 and was ordained a priest on 7 May 1988, being sent to Zimbabwe the year after. He holds a Diploma in Economics from Mysore University, India. Since 1989 he has been a missionary in Zimbabwe, in the Archdiocese of Bulawayo, where he held the following positions: 1990–1992: vicar of Holy Cross Parish in Tshabalala, 1992–1997: parish mission Embakwe, 1997–2005: parish priest of St. Joseph Tsholotsho and dean of the Southern and Northern Deanery, 2005–2008: diocesan bursar; since 2001: ''ex officio'' director of the Catholic Development Commission (Caritas Zimbabwe) from 2008: regional superior of the Society of the Divine Word in Zimbabwe. He became

archdiocesan In church governance, a diocese or bishopric is the ecclesiastical district under the jurisdiction of a bishop. History In the later organization of the Roman Empire, the increasingly subdivided provinces were administratively associate ...

treasurer in 2005, and the local

superior Superior may refer to: *Superior (hierarchy), something which is higher in a hierarchical structure of any kind Places *Superior (proposed U.S. state), an unsuccessful proposal for the Upper Peninsula of Michigan to form a separate state *Lake ...

of the Divine Word Missionaries in 2008. On 20 June 2009, Kaliyanil was appointed the third archbishop of Bulawayo by Pope Benedict XVI. He succeeds the politically outspoken

Pius Ncube Pius Alick Mvundla Ncube (born 31 December 1946) served as the Roman Catholic Archbishop of Bulawayo, Zimbabwe, until he resigned on 11 September 2007. Widely known for his human rights advocacy, Ncube was an outspoken critic of former Preside ...

, who resigned as archbishop in September 2007 amid accusations of adultery.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Kaliyanil, Alex 1960 births Living people People from Thrissur district 21st-century Roman Catholic archbishops in Zimbabwe Indian Roman Catholic missionaries Roman Catholic missionaries in Zimbabwe Divine Word Missionaries Order Indian emigrants to Zimbabwe Roman Catholic archbishops of Bulawayo Indian Roman Catholics Indian Roman Catholic archbishops