All Saints Stoneycroft Parish Church, Liverpool
The first Holy Qurbana of Liverpool St Thomas Indian Orthodox church was conducted on 18th October 2003 by Rev. Fr. Abraham Thomas (Abyachen) for a very few immigrant community from Kerala. In the initial stage different priests from London and Northwest UK served our community and later Rev. Fr. Happy Jacob served for 5 years. Liverpool St Thomas Indian Orthodox Church was declared as a parish in 2005 by Late H.G. Dr. Thomas Mar Makarios Metropolitan, then Diocesan Metropolitan. Our church was registered under UK Charity Council.
As time passed, various bishops of our parent church (H.G. Philipose Mar Eusebius [Late], Metropolitan of Thumpamon, H.G. Dr. Zacharia Mar Theophilos, Bishop of Malabar Diocese, visited our church and blessed its members. We have been blessed with the presence of then Diocesan Metropolitan Late H.G. Dr. Thomas Mar Makarios, in December 24, 2006 who conducted our Christmas service of that year.
A small community in Northwest UK, we started with 7 families which steadily grown to present 40 families and Almighty is helping us to flourish more. At the start we had one Holy Qurbana on 1st Sunday of the month and then added second service on 3rd Saturday which later changed to 3rd Sunday. Currently we have regular Malayalam service on 1st and 3rd Sunday of the month at 3:00pm. Rev. Arthur Cooper, the minister of All Saints Parish Church, Stoneycroft allowed us to use his beautiful church with all its facilities for our service. We are very pleased to have such a church in our disposal and for this are very much indebted to Rev. Arthur. In 2009, during the Episcopal visit of Diocesan metropolitan H.G. Mathews Mar Thimothios inaugurated our new website which facilitated us to spread the name of our church locally and globally.
Looking on the future generation of our church we are lucky enough to conduct English service on 31st January and 28th February 2010 which was a great success among our younger generation.
On an average of 65-120 people attend the holy mass every time. We are also conducting regular prayer meetings on the first and third Saturday evening of every month prior to the worship on Sunday with the leadership of our vicar. The prayer meetings are conducted at church member’s houses on a rota basis. This practice helps to encourage members and their families to know each other better. We also run a Sunday school programme which is conducted after the Holy Qurbana. Some of the other recurring programmes of our church are Harvest Festival, Church Anniversary, OVBS, Christmas, Onam Festival, Parish Day, Christmas Carol Singing, Ecumenical Christmas Programme participation, Marthamariam Samagam, New Year service and Holy Week.
Administration
The administration of the Parish is being conducted by a Managing Committee, elected by the General Body from among the members, as per the Constitution of the Church. The tenure of the office is for a period of one year. The Vicar of the Parish is the President of the Managing Committee. The day-to-day administration is carried out by the Hon. Trustee and the Hon. Secretary assisted by the Managing Committee members.
