Kottayam: Mar Thomas Thennat, the bishop of Gwalior archdiocese in Madhya Pradesh, passed away on Saturday after a road accident in the central Indian state. He was 65.
The accident occurred as he was returning to the Bishop House at Morar in Gwalior city after attending the annual celebrations of a school under the archdiocese.
Soon after the accident, the bishop was shifted to the nearest local hospital. After receiving first aid, he was transferred to the St Joseph Hospital in Gwalior, but his life couldn't be saved.
He was appointed the Gwalior bishop by Pope Francis on October 18, 2016. Earlier, he had served in a parish in Jhabua diocese from 2008 to 2012 and subsequently he was the parish priest at Mankapur in Nagpur archdiocese.
Thomas Thennat was born on November 26, 1953, at Koodalloor in the diocese of Kottayam in Kerala.
His native parish is the St Joseph Knanaya Catholic Church at Ettumanoor in Kottayam district.
He was ordained a priest on October 21, 1978 after studies at the Minor Seminary of Pallottigiri in Thiruvananthapuram.
The Catholic order of the Society of the Catholic Apostolate to which the deceased Bishop belonged is also known as the Pallottines after the Roman priest Saint Vincent Pallotti who founded it in 1835.
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