Diocese of Ootacamund
Set among the Nilgiris — the meeting place of the Western and Eastern Ghats — the diocese has grown, since seeds sown by Jesuit missionaries in the 1600s and nurtured by the Paris Foreign Mission, into a communion of Tamil, Malayalam, Kannada and English-speaking parishes across the Blue Mountains.
By the Apostolic Constitution Nuntiatur in Psalmis of Pope Pius XII, promulgated on 3rd July, 1955, the diocese of Ootacamund was created by partition from the mother diocese of Mysore, of which it had been part from 1941 to 1955. The Church of the Sacred Heart, Udhagamandalam, was chosen as its Cathedral, with Antony Cardinal Padiyara as its first Bishop.
Long before the diocese took shape, Jesuit missionaries of the Madurai Mission carried the Christian faith into the Kongunadu country — often at great personal cost.
Rev. Fr Jacomo Finicio SJ is sent to Calicut, at the request of Bishop Roz of Angamalli, to search for the presence of Thomas Christians in the "Toda and Badaga land."
Rev. Fr Robert de Nobili SJ and his companions, Portuguese Jesuits of the Madurai Mission, bring the Christian faith to the people of southern Kongunadu — today's Coimbatore and Erode districts.
Rev. Fr Balthasar da Costa, based at Karumathampatti, baptizes the first 150 Christians of the Sathyamangalam area, prepared by catechist Savarirayan. Rev. Fr Martinz, posted here in 1643, is beaten and imprisoned for the faith, yet Peria Kodivery grows into a mission of its own, with 15 churches soon serving the area.
On 3rd June, 1674, St John de Britto reaches Sathyamangalam on his way to Kolai, falling ill and resting a month before continuing on 1st July through Peria Kodivery, Anthiyur, Urachikottai and Nerinchipettai — leaving his footprints across the whole territory.
Frs Antony Pereira and B. Noguera lead the mission from 1684; Fr Antonio Riberio serves 14 years in Sathyamangalam, administering 400 baptisms in 1685 alone, before Fr Lucas Menezes takes charge in 1695.
From a single mission handed to the Paris Fathers to a diocese in its own right — the story runs through Pondicherry, Coimbatore and Mysore before arriving in the hills.
On the suppression of the Society of Jesus, the Propagation of Faith entrusts the vast Carnatic Mission — stretching from Pondicherry to Kumbakonam, Coimbatore, Bangalore and Mysore — to the Fathers of the Paris Foreign Mission, based at Pondicherry.
After years of difficulty, two M.E.P. Fathers are permitted to settle in Karumathampatty, Coimbatore — the first step toward the hills.
One of the Fathers takes charge of the small, growing out-stations of the Coimbatore Mission in the Nilgiris.
The community grows steadily after the ghat road from Mettupalayam to Coonoor is completed, and a small chapel is built to serve it.
Coimbatore and Mysore are raised to separate pro-Vicariates Apostolic, the first step in a slow climb toward full diocesan status.
Coimbatore and Mysore are elevated again, this time to full Vicariates Apostolic.
With the establishment of the Hierarchy in India by Pope Leo XIII, Coimbatore and Mysore — once shared pro-Vicariates — become dioceses of their own.
The Nilgiris district, until then part of Coimbatore Diocese, is attached to and then reconstituted within the Diocese of Mysore, where it remains for fourteen years amid difficulties of language, culture and distance.
By the Apostolic Constitution Nuntiatur in Psalmis of Pope Pius XII, the diocese is carved from Mysore. The Church of the Sacred Heart, Udhagamandalam, is named its Cathedral, with Antony Cardinal Padiyara as first Bishop.
The diocese covers 7,312 sq. km across three types of terrain, rising from tea-covered hills to dry plains — each shaping the life and livelihood of its parishes differently.
Where the Western and Eastern Ghats meet, home to Doddabetta — the highest peak of the Eastern Ghats — and source of the river Bhavani.
Lying in Erode district within the Western Ghats, these hills are wilder country — wildlife-rich and given to hardier cultivation.
Watered by the Cauvery and the Bhavani, this Erode-district plain carries the diocese's warmest, driest parishes.
The Nilgiris sits at the junction of Tamil Nadu, Kerala and Karnataka. Inter-linguistic marriages are common, and Mass is offered in whichever tongue a parish calls home. Because Udhagamandalam and Coonoor were once colonized by the English, Anglo-Indian communities remain in these two vicariates today.
"Unity in diversity, in spite of caste, creed, colour and language."
Most of the faithful earn their living as daily-wage workers and farmers. Alongside them, the diocese is home to distinct tribal communities across the Nilgiris and Erode districts — some still living deep in the forest, largely untouched by the modern world outside.
The Urali of Gundri and Makkampalam speak Urali — a language with no written script of its own.