Rev.Fr Msgr Dr Antony Kozhuvanal is, indeed, more than a person, or an institution or a movement.

Rev.Fr Msgr Dr Antony Kozhuvanal is, indeed, more than a person, or an institution or a movement. He is truly an ” Event” in our times. A scholar of repute, an organiser of the first order, an administrator unique anda priest par excellence, the Holy See of Rome directly raised him to the title of Monsignor a year ago.

As the founder director of the START – the St. Thomas Academy of Research and Training, Kozhikode, Achan has worked wondersin the field of academic training for hundreds of thousands of students from the migrant areas of Malabar.

As one of the Founder leaders of INFAM, he made it a great Mass Movement in its initial years, giving a rude shock to both the UDF and the LDF for ignoring the genuine demands of the poor and middle class farmers, it was alleged in later years that the Movement was strategically sabotaged by the political leadership with the silent concurrence of some of the high and the mighty in the church too, converting it into its present plight of ignominy.

Kozhuvanal Achan was one who always has been in the habit of building up a strong Lay Leadership in the Church, visualising some Sort of a Responsible Partnership between the Clergy and the Laity, in the true spirit of the Second Vatican Council. Perhaps the only one bishop in our Church – Latin or theSyrian– who took it in that spirit was Bishop Mar Sebastian Vayalil who while formulating the Rules of the Pastoral Council 50 years before provided for a Chairman from the Laity, besides the Bishop being the President of it. And the practice has been meticulously preservedand followed by Bishop Vayalil’s equally noble and illustrious successors — Mar Joseph Pallikkaparampil and Mar JosephKallaranghatt — till date.

The sky will not fall If in our other dioceses too — Latin, Syrian or Malankara — this is made a model and practice, upholding the principle of collegiality of the Clergy and the Laity in the Church , making it a more participatory one. Fr. Kozhuvanal has always been one beloging to the Bishop Vayalil School– may be because he too originally hails from Palai ! –sharing the true spirit of tha Vatican 2.

Monsignor Kozhuvanal is on his 75th birthday today. Always simple, straightand unassuming, yet very dignified, elegant and jovial, and with an abundant sense of humour — a true like of him I have seen only in Calicut and Calicut alone, Monsignor Dr.Thomas Panackal, the Vicar General of the Kozhikode diocese–and with an inimitably disarming quality of courtesy and graciousness, also accompanied by an hospitality incomparably persuasive, warm and loving. On all counts, Very Rev.Msgr Dr.Antony Kozhuvanal is a person with a difference, and a priest with a difference.

May God theLord bless him abundantly and keep him Healthy and cheerful for many many more years.

Ayushman Bhava.

CYRIAC THOMAS