The Bishop
Rt. Rev. Thomas Saundaranayagam
Jaffna’s Catholic bishop, Rt. Rev. Dr. Thomas Saundaranayagam, reflects on a time when the north and south of Sri Lanka were closely connected — through shared schools, travel and worship. He speaks about the ruptures that followed, and the role of the Church in advocating for truth and reconciliation.
We first stopped at Bishop’s House on a leafy road outside Jaffna town, but the gatekeeper told us the Bishop was in Mannar and would not return until late that evening. Instead we walked next door to St Mary’s Cathedral, built in 1789, and then to St Martin’s Seminary, where the Bishop had studied. The old buildings, weathered but dignified, had survived the war.
The next morning I telephoned again. While waiting for him to come to the phone I realised I had no idea how one properly addresses a bishop. Having spent several days interviewing elders in Jaffna, I had fallen into the habit of calling senior men “uncle”. I suspect I addressed the Bishop the same way more than once during our conversation.
Fortunately he ignored my slips and agreed to meet.
When we sat down later that day, he was warm but direct. There was little time for small talk. He spoke first about the Church’s role during the years of war — giving ordinary people a voice and standing up for those whose freedoms were threatened.
I tried to steer the conversation back to his own life. Eventually he relented. When I asked whether he had always wanted to become a bishop, he laughed softly and explained that in the Church no one becomes a bishop because they want to. One is asked.
It was the only moment in the interview when the Bishop seemed briefly like the boy who had once grown up quietly on the island of Kayts.
Jaffna
November 10, 2010
Transcript and translations
Language
Subjects discussed
There was no anxiety, there was no conflict
My hometown is Kayts… the island of Kayts. Just across. Our ancestral home is still there. God has in a way blessed us. We were never in want and all those things.
But somehow or other I had a cousin of mine who long ago had become a priest. He dedicated his life to God. And so that also made an impression on me. So I also decided to become a priest.
Though being an only son, but nevertheless I made that decision.
Kayts is a very rural area and we had our own Catholic college there, St Anthony’s College. Then I joined St Patrick’s College, then St Martin’s Seminary…minor seminary here. At the time the life was very quiet; there was no anxiety, there was no conflict, there was no competition. Not like that sort.
We grew up in an atmosphere where it was very calm and quiet, there was no ethnic strife. When we studied at St Patrick’s College, even Sinhalese students were studying with us from the south. And the medium of instruction was in English, therefore we all studied together. And between the south and the north, the people were moving around and we had the Yal Devi train functioning. And in the morning you get into the train and by evening you are there in Colombo. Same in Colombo also, you are here the following morning. So there was a lot of communication between the south and the north.
Here among the Christians ourselves there was much more communion because the Sinhalese also used to come to Madhu Church in large numbers and we also used to meet them and worship together and so we felt we were one family.
I grew up here and I was a priest working here in Jaffna. From 1981 onwards I was the bishop of Mannar, the first bishop of Mannar. Then in 1992 when our former Bishop Deogupillai retired, I was requested by Rome to take charge of the diocese of Jaffna.
(Laughs) In the church nobody becomes a bishop because he wants to become a bishop. We are chosen to become a bishop. Then you say yes or no. No one has the freedom to say yes or now. So not by your choice you are made a bishop. You are made a bishop.
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