Father Lijo Kallarackal stood outside St. Martin de Porres Church on a Saturday evening in June as he surveyed a crowd on the parking lot dancing to traditional Indian music, while others enjoyed each other’s company as they sampled from a variety of food stands.

At the heart of the Sacred Heart Mission, established at the Hazelwood church last October to serve the Syro-Malabar Indian Catholic community in St. Louis, is a foundation that fosters spirituality, culture and community, Father Kallarackal said.

“The people long to have their own liturgy, what they were used to back in India, and the devotions that are very strong in the Syro-Malabar Church — they want to continue that,” he said. “We are a small community, and so slowly, we are starting to build that up and we want to grow.”

The Syro-Malabar Church is an Eastern Catholic Church based in Kerala, India. It is the second largest Eastern Catholic Church in the world (the Greek Ukrainian Catholic Church is the largest), and one of 23 Eastern-Rite churches that are in full communion with the Holy See. There are about 20 million Catholics in India, representing almost 2% of the total population.

The Syro-Malabar Indian Catholic community has been present in St. Louis for several decades but recently was established as a mission under the St. Thomas Syro-Malabar Catholic Eparchy of Chicago. Father Kallarackal is the mission director while continuing to serve as pastor at St. Ferdinand Parish in Florissant, which celebrates the Roman Rite liturgy.

Sabu Zacharias was raised in the Syro-Malabar Church in India and came to the United States in 2000, settling in St. Louis in 2003. He was among those who took part in a Thirunal, a three-day festival of faith and fellowship for the feast of the Sacred Heart, held June 7-9 at the mission. Activities included Holy Qurbana (Mass) celebrated in Malayalam (the primary language in Kerala), a eucharistic procession, Sacred Heart novena prayers, food, cultural activities and a visit from Bishop Mar Joy Alappatt, head of the Chicago eparchy, and Auxiliary Bishop Mark Rivituso.

The mission has about 40 registered households, but its members seek to spread the word, especially to other Catholics from India who belong to Roman Rite parishes near their homes, said Zacharias, who also attends Ascension Church in Chesterfield.

“Many of us are immigrant families, and so we are helping one another with moving into houses, finding apartments,” he said. “The community is very charity-oriented and helping each other.”

In addition to celebrating Qurbana every Sunday at noon, the mission offers religious education classes for youths (four children received their first Communion and two were confirmed this year), First Friday devotions, a family Rosary that rotates among homes and the Stations of the Cross.

In the early days of the St. Louis community, Indian Catholics met at each others’ homes and invited visiting priests to celebrate Qurbana. The community most recently had made its home at the Missionary Sisters of St. Peter Claver in Town and Country but was beginning to outgrow the space, several of them said.

Devotions are an important part of the faith community, Father Kallarackal noted, including the Rosary, devotion to the Sacred Heart (several shared stories of their parents and grandparents who promoted the devotion at home) and the saints.

“In a forest, the big trees are survived by the little bushes around it,” he said. “Devotions are like that. The Eucharist is the main stream of that, but devotions lead you into it. If you don’t have devotions, you become dry. They feed people into the eucharistic celebration.”

Parish council member Jai Thomas described the value of bringing together culture and faith and how important it is to have a faith community to pass along those values to future generations.

“I think why I’m drawn to this (community) is because this gives an opportunity to exercise my faith in

the way I had been formed in it and also pass those values to our children and to other families,” he said. “And in the process, we bring our faith and service mindset to the to the whole area.”

Thomas’ wife, Tessy, who leads the children’s Sunday school, said their two children, now adults, went to Catholic schools in St. Louis but did not know many students who were of Indian descent and Catholic. The mission serves a younger generation, she said, where they “can relate better and see people from the same background — so they have a connection, you know?”

Father Kallarackal was ordained as a Benedictine priest in Kerala in 2003. He was raised in the Syro-Malabar Church but learned the Roman Rite liturgy while in seminary formation. He and two other Benedictine priests — Father Saji Mathew Cheruparambil, pastor of St. Joseph in Manchester, and Father Sebastian Mundackal, pastor of St. Monica and St. Richard parishes in Creve Coeur — came to the Archdiocese of St. Louis within the last 20 years. Father Kallarackal arrived here in 2008 and was incardinated into the archdiocese in 2011.

The priest said he hopes the mission will eventually grow into a full-blown parish. For now, the community remains focused on faith and family infused with the culture of India.

“Family and faith is very important to live and practice and hand over,” he said. “That’s why I’ve become involved as part of this, to help them do that.”

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>> Eastern Rite Catholic Churches in St. Louis

Ukrainian: St. Mary’s Assumption Ukrainian Greek-Catholic Church in south St. Louis County is under the Eparchy of Chicago. Deacon Eugene Logusch serves as parish administrator, and Father James Deshotels, SJ, regularly celebrates the Divine Liturgy there. To learn more, visit assumptionukstl.org.

Maronite: St. Raymond Maronite Cathedral in Downtown St. Louis and St. Elizabeth-St. Raymond Church in Crestwood are part of the Catholic Maronite Eparchy of Our Lady of Lebanon-Los Angeles. Father John Nahal is pastor of St. Elizabeth-St. Raymond, which offers Roman Catholic Latin-Rite Masses and Catholic Maronite-Rite Masses and also serves as rector of St. Raymond Cathedral. See stelizabethhungary.org and www.straymond-mc.org for more.

Byzantine: St. Louis Byzantine Catholic Church in St. Louis is part of the Byzantine Catholic Eparchy of Parma, Ohio. Father Joe Weber serves as parochial administrator. Sacraments are also celebrated by four other bi-ritual priests: Father Paul Niemann, Father James Theby, Father James Deshotels, SJ, and Father Steven Hawkes-Teeples, SJ. See byzcath.org/stlouis or facebook.com/stlouisbyzantinecatholic

Syro-Malabar: Sacred Heart Syro-Malabar Mission was established in October 2023 at St. Martin de Porres Church in Hazelwood to serve the Syro-Malabar Catholic community. It is part of the St. Thomas Syro-Malabar Catholic Eparchy of Chicago. Father Lijo Kallarackal serves as director of the mission as well as pastor of St. Ferdinand Parish in Florissant. To learn more, visit sacredheartstl.org.