Saint Thomas offers a model for the Indian Church: He arrived with humility, listening and engaging with Indian culture rather than imposing on it — a spirit the Church should continue today instead of withdrawing inward.

The Church must stay engaged with India’s rapid changes: As India grows economically, the Church should focus on serving the marginalized (farmers, migrants, youth, minorities), addressing social issues, environmental concerns, and interfaith dialogue, rather than becoming political.

Service and honest questioning strengthen credibility: The Church’s legacy in education, healthcare, and social service remains its strongest witness; it should welcome doubts and hard questions from young people while remaining present and confident in a diverse, pluralistic society.

(UCA News) — Legend has it that a skeptical apostle stepped off a boat on the Malabar coast sometime around AD 52, carrying nothing but conviction and a handful of unanswered questions.

Saint Thomas had doubted before he believed, and that doubt never quite left him. It became, instead, the shape of his mission.

He did not arrive in India to lecture a civilization already ancient and layered with its own wisdom. He arrived to listen, to learn the rhythms of a new land, and only then to speak.

The communities that trace their roots to him have carried that instinct for two thousand years: be fully Indian, be fully Christian, and never treat those two things as a contradiction.

It is worth asking, in 2026, what that instinct still has to........

© Eurasia Review