IVANIOS, MAR (GIVERGIS THOMAS PANIKERVIRTIS)

Malankar rite archbishop, leader in reunion efforts;b. Mavelikkara, Kerala, India, Sept. 18, 1882; d. Trivandrum, India, July 15, 1953. Ivanios, member of a leading Syrian family belonging to the dissident group in the ma lankar rite, received his early education in Protestant and government schools. After studies in the seminary at Kottayam he was ordained deacon in 1898 and priest in 1909. He was the first Kerala cleric to graduate from Madras Christian College, where he obtained an M.A. in economics (1906). In 1908 he was named principal of a school in Kottayam. He was instrumental in establishing the autonomy of the Syro-Jacobite Church in India under a catholicos (1911–12). From 1913 to 1919 he was professor of Syriac and political economy at Serampore College, a Protestant institution near Calcutta. In 1919 he founded and acted as superior of the Order of the Imitation of Christ, the first religious communities in his Church for men and women. The malines conversa tions led him to inquire about reunion with Rome. As bishop (1925) with the name Mar Ivanios, and as metropolitan (1928), he received the approval of other Syrian Jacobite leaders to continue his correspondence with Rome. In 1930 Mar Ivanios entered into union with Rome, along with his suffragan, Mar Theophilos, the members of his religious communities, and a few laymen. As archbishop of Trivandrum (1932–53), a see belonging to the Malankar rite, he strove for reunion with other Christians and was zealous in erecting churches and schools throughout his jurisdiction. In 1950 he established a university college. He traveled widely in Europe, Australia, Canada, and the U.S., and published many periodical articles and booklets in English and Malayalam on the liturgy of his rite and on the Syriac language.

Bibliography: m. gibbons, Mar Ivanios (Dublin 1962). e. tisserant, Eastern Christianity in India, tr. e. r. hambye (Westminster, Md. 1957) 157–162; Dictionnaire de théologie catholique 14.2:3143–49.

[e. r. hambye]