A priest known for his social activism resigned as the vicar of a parish in India’s Ernakulam-Angamaly archeparchy Sunday after he was asked to celebrate the Syro-Malabar Church’s new uniform Eucharistic liturgy.
Fr. Augustine Vattoly, the parish vicar of St. Augustine Church, Kadamakkudy, in Kerala state, announced his resignation Sept. 14 in an open letter to Archbishop Joseph Pamplany, the archiepiscopal vicar of Ernakulam-Angamaly.
Vattoly said he had never celebrated the uniform liturgy, also known as the “Unified Mass,” in which the priest faces the people during the Liturgy of the Word, turns toward the altar for the Liturgy of the Eucharist, and then faces the people again after Communion.
In common with most priests and lay people in the Ernakulam-Angamaly archeparchy, Vattoly celebrates the Eucharistic liturgy facing the congregation throughout, a practice adopted in the wake of Vatican Council II.
The 54-year-old priest said that a parishioner had requested the Unified Mass, but he was “not ready” to adopt the new practice, whose introduction in the Ernakulam-Angamaly archeparchy provoked long-running protests.
The protests, which took the form of hunger strikes, street skirmishes, and the burning of cardinals’ effigies, appeared to end with the approval of a compromise in August by the Synod of Bishops, the Syro-Malabar Church’s supreme authority.
But Vattoly described the liturgical conflict as an “ongoing dispute” in his resignation letter.
“I will submit a letter seeking withdrawal of my resignation letter the very day when the mode of Mass where the priest faces the congregation (instead of the Unified Mass) is declared in the archdiocese as a liturgical variant,” he wrote.
“The ongoing dispute over the mode of offering Mass is against the teachings of Jesus Christ and the life that he led. Many bishops seem unwilling to live a life that Christ stood for. In this situation, I will always be with the faithful of the archdiocese, including its priests and nuns.”
Vattoly is a familiar figure among India’s Syro-Malabar Catholics due to his advocacy on social issues. He has organized protests in favor of families displaced by construction projects, landless members of the Dalit community, and people whose wells ran dry due to what they said was excessive water consumption by a Coca Cola factory.
But Vattoly is probably best known for supporting a group of five nuns who protested at the High Court of Kerala in 2018 against Bishop Franco Mulakkal, after the bishop was accused of raping a nun. Mulakkal denied the allegation and was found not guilty by a trial court in Kerala state in 2022. Pope Francis accepted Mulakkal’s resignation as the Bishop of Jullundur in 2023, amid divisions in the diocese.
Vattoly’s support for the nuns was controversial among Indian Catholics, some of whom branded him a “rebel priest,” while others praised him as “prophetic.”
In his resignation letter, Vattoly acknowledged that, according to the compromise formula approved the Syro-Malabar Church’s Synod of Bishops, parishes in the Ernakulam-Angamaly archeparchy are expected to offer one Unified Mass on Sundays and other holy days of obligation, in return for continuing to celebrating the Eucharistic liturgy facing the people throughout.
Vattoly said that under the compromise formula, Catholics have a right to request the new uniform Eucharistic liturgy in their parishes. He argued it would be wrong for him to stand against the consensus. As he could not accept being the cause of division in his parish, he said he had decided to resign if he was asked to celebrate the new liturgy.
In his resignation letter, Vattoly lamented the liturgy dispute and accused the Syro-Malabar hierarchy of focusing on liturgical issues while overlooking the needs of the poor. He also praised the conduct of the priests and people of the archeparchy, which he described as brave and principled.