Part IV: Chalice in safekeeping - in India

By DAWN PROSSER
Director of Communications
(Fourth in a series)

In the United States, a newly-ordained priest might receive a chalice as a gift from parents or family members. The custom in India is similar, according to Father Sunny Dominic, native of the Diocese of Palai in Kerla, south India.
 
The priest is currently serving as pastor at St. Mary Parish in Larchwood and Holy Name Parish in Rock Rapids. He was ordained at St. Sebastian Church in Manjamattam, India, on April 12, 1994. His two sisters purchased a chalice for their brother for his ordination.
 
“It’s special to me because my sisters gave it to me,” Father Dominic explained. “My sisters feel great I am using the same chalice.”

 Father DominicThe priest said it is stored in his hometown at his brother’s home, along with cards from the 1994 ordination. When visiting India each January, he celebrates Mass for his family with the ordination vessel. 

 “I keep my chalice at home and when we have a family Mass, first Communion, a wedding or there is some function when I go home, I use the chalice,” he said. “I usually have Mass for my family. In my home parish, I celebrate with a different chalice.”
 
In addition to the vessel, Father Dominic’s sisters gave him vestments as an ordination gift, which he uses when celebrating Masses for his family. His uncle purchased a cassock for his nephew.
 Father Sunny Dominic (center) while ministering in India“People liked to give me what I needed (for ministry),” the priest said of the family gifts.
 
However, the vestments he received for his 1994 ordination would not be exactly the same as those worn by priests ordained in the Diocese of Sioux City, but those of a Syro-Malabar priest.
 
“I was born into the oriental rite – Syro-Malabar*, associated with Rome,” the Indian priest explained, noting the liturgy “is totally different than the Latin rite.”
 
Chalices for priests
Some priests plan to pass on their chalice to another priest in the family or leave it with the diocese for a brother priest. Father Dominic isn’t sure how he will pass along his as he doesn’t anticipate another ordination in his family.
 
“Maybe I will give it to priests who are in need of one,” he pondered.
 
In the past, the priest would provide chalices for priests at home who might not have one of their own, he explained.
 
“I used to take chalices from here to give to newly-ordained priests in India. For friends or distant family (being ordained) and give them as a gift,” he said, explaining many times the Knights of Columbus would purchase a chalice as a memorial for fourth-degree Knights who have died. The chalices were often presented to a parish or priest with the name of the deceased Knight engraved at the bottom of the vessel. If a KC chalice was not needed by a parish, it would be available to pass on to another priest for liturgical use.

 *There is one eparchy in the United States made up of the Syro-Malabar faithful, which is in Chicago. According to syromalabarchurch.in, there was a migration of Catholics from India beginning in the 1960s. In 1996, efforts began “to have a diocese for the Syro-Malabar faithful residing in the U.S. Pope John Paul II established the St. Thomas Syro-Malabar Catholic Diocese of Chicago in 2001.”
 
Father Dominic was incardinated into the Latin rite of the church when joining the Holy Spirit Fathers of the Latin International German congregation. Father Dominic was incardinated into the Diocese of Sioux City in 2009.