About Us
This small, compact and coherent community with 605 faithful in 172 families under 6 BCC Units in and around Thycaud traces its origin from some of our forefathers coming from areas like Panakudi, Vadakkankulam and Valliyoor. They belonged to an artisan community known as ‘Kammaalas’. They were brought in from the above areas in present day Tamil Nadu by the native ruler to work as gold smith, silver smith and so on in the palaces and Dewaswams. They were staunch Catholics and held their faith close to their heart in their new home, Thycaud.
Today’s church was a prayer hall erected in 1960 to foster their faith in the new surroundings. It was said to be erected by Mr. Vedanayagom Achary who seemingly inherited the land from his Hindu father-in-law, Mr. Gnanamuthu Devandran Achary who later got converted into his son-in-law’s faith. The Prayer Hall and later, the Church were consecrated to our mother Blessed Virgin Mary. Those days, it was one of the very few Catholic centers of worship in the capital city.
In 1881 the prayer hall was converted into a chapel and was blessed by Fr. Victor OCD, the vicar at St. Joseph’s Church [presently Cathedral] at Palayam. In 1914, Sree Moolam Thirunal, the king of Travancore, converted the existing dispensary at Thycaud into a hospital and requested the service of the Holy Cross Sisters through the bishop of Quilon, Dr. Maria Benzigar. By 1916, a group of sisters came here to serve in the hospital and were given a quarters for them to live as if in a convent.
In 1978 the chapel and the adjoining property was handed over to the diocese of Trivandrum by Mr. Sebastian Vaidhyanathan and it was raised into a parish with Fr. George Paul as its parish priest. The church was demolished soon to replace it with the present church and it was done at the time of Fr. Soosai Packiam who became the bishop and now the archbishop of Trivandrum. The new church was consecrated in 1979.
The Grotto of Pieta was inaugurated in 1997, the shrine of Christ the King in the Jubilee Year 2000 and the Hall was opened in2007.
