Marampudi Joji (7 October 1942 – 27 August 2010) was the third

Archbishop In Christian denominations, an archbishop is a bishop of higher rank or office. In most cases, such as the Catholic Church, there are many archbishops who either have jurisdiction over an ecclesiastical province in addition to their own archdi ...

of Hyderabad. He was born in

Bhimavaram Bhimavaram is a city and headquarters of West Godavari district of the Andhra Pradesh state of India. It is the administrative headquarters of Bhimavaram mandal in Bhimavaram revenue division. It is a part of Bhimavaram Urban Development Aut ...

and died at the Bishop's House, Hyderabad, Andhra Pradesh. He knew

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...

Telugu Telugu may refer to: * Telugu language, a major Dravidian language of India *Telugu people, an ethno-linguistic group of India * Telugu script, used to write the Telugu language ** Telugu (Unicode block), a block of Telugu characters in Unicode S ...

, and

English English usually refers to: * English language * English people English may also refer to: Peoples, culture, and language * ''English'', an adjective for something of, from, or related to England ** English national ide ...

Early years & education

Joji was educated at the

Lutheran Lutheranism is one of the largest branches of Protestantism, identifying primarily with the theology of Martin Luther, the 16th-century German monk and reformer whose efforts to reform the theology and practice of the Catholic Church launched th ...

Boarding School in

Peddapuram Peddapuram is a town in the Kakinada district of Andhra Pradesh in South India. The town also forms a part of Godavari Urban Development Authority. Peddapuram is known for its milk based sweet called PalaKova. The town is also popular in manufac ...

near

Samalkot Samarlakota (Telugu:సామర్లకోట) is a town in Kakinada district of the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh. The town forms a part of Godavari Urban Development Authority. It was previously known as ''Chamarlakota'' (Telugu:చామ� ...

which is managed by the

Priests A priest is a religious leader authorized to perform the sacred rituals of a religion, especially as a mediatory agent between humans and one or more deity, deities. They also have the authority or power to administer religious rites; in p ...

of the

Andhra Evangelical Lutheran Church Andhra Pradesh (, abbr. AP) is a state in the south-eastern coastal region of India. It is the seventh-largest state by area covering an area of and tenth-most populous state with 49,386,799 inhabitants. It is bordered by Telangana to the ...

(AELC).

Ordination & Pastorship

Joji was ordained a priest on 14 December 1971Catholic Hierarchy, Archbishop Joji
/ref> in the diocese of

Vijayawada Vijayawada, formerly known as Bezawada, is the second largest city in the Indian state of Andhra Pradesh and is a part of the state's Capital Region. It is the administrative headquarters of the NTR district. Its metropolitan region comprises NT ...

.Archdiocese of Hyderabad, Ecclesiastical Units 2008, Archbishop's House, 9-1-17/1, Sardar Patel Road, Secunderabad 500 003, Andhra Pradesh, India, pp. 40-41 Joji was privileged to have received Blessed

Mother Teresa Mary Teresa Bojaxhiu, MC (; 26 August 1910 – 5 September 1997), better known as Mother Teresa ( sq, Nënë Tereza), was an Indian-Albanian Catholic nun who, in 1950, founded the Missionaries of Charity. Anjezë Gonxhe Bojaxhiu () was bo ...

when she went to

to initiate the work of the Missionaries of Charity.

Bishopric

Diocese of Khammam

On 21 December 1991, he was appointed the Bishop of Khammam and consecrated on 19 March 1992. He served until 8 November 1996 when he was transferred to the

Diocese of Vijayawada The Roman Catholic Diocese of Vijayawada ( la, Viiayavadan(us)) is a diocese located in the city of Vijayawada in the Ecclesiastical province of Visakhapatnam in India. Administratively, the diocese encompasses the geographical Krishna distri ...

Diocese of Vijayawada

Bishop Joji became the Bishop of Vijayawada on 8 November 1996. However, he took charge of the diocese only on 19 January 1997.

Archbishop of Hyderabad

On 29 January 2000, he was appointed the Archbishop of

Hyderabad Hyderabad ( ; , ) is the capital and largest city of the Indian state of Telangana and the ''de jure'' capital of Andhra Pradesh. It occupies on the Deccan Plateau along the banks of the Musi River (India), Musi River, in the northern part ...

. He was installed by Archbishop Giorgio Zur in the presence of his predecessor Archbishop S. Arulappa and of Bishop Joseph S. Thumma on 30 April 2000. Joji inaugurated the Hyderabad session of the scholarly

Church History Association of India Church may refer to: Religion * Church (building), a building for Christian religious activities * Church (congregation), a local congregation of a Christian denomination * Church service, a formalized period of Christian communal worship * C ...

incorporating Church Historians of the

Pentecostal Pentecostalism or classical Pentecostalism is a Protestant Charismatic Christian movement

Protestant Protestantism is a Christian denomination, branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Reformation, Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century agai ...

Orthodox Orthodox, Orthodoxy, or Orthodoxism may refer to: Religion * Orthodoxy, adherence to accepted norms, more specifically adherence to creeds, especially within Christianity and Judaism, but also less commonly in non-Abrahamic religions like Neo-pag ...

, and

Catholic The Catholic Church, also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the largest Christian church, with 1.3 billion baptized Catholics worldwide . It is among the world's oldest and largest international institutions, and has played a ...

traditions. Archbishop Joji was known for his able administration. He seemed to have headed the Diocese of Vijayawada's Social Service Society before being elevated to the Bishopric of Khammam. The Archbishop has principally consecrated three Bishops of Andhra Pradesh: * Bishop of Kurnool,

Most Rev. The Most Reverend is a style applied to certain religious figures, primarily within the historic denominations of Christianity, but occasionally in some more modern traditions also. It is a variant of the more common style "The Reverend". Anglic ...

P. Anthony (19 April 2008) * Bishop of Cuddapah,

G. Prasad (1 March 2008) * Bishop of Nellore,

D. M. Prakasam (17 January 2007)Catholic Hierarchy, Bishop Prakasam
/ref>

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Joji, M 2010 deaths 1942 births Telugu people 21st-century Roman Catholic archbishops in India 20th-century Indian Roman Catholic theologians