Christian woman denied church burial in India as she was married to a Hindu

The Christian grandmother of Indian actress Priyanka Chopra passed away recently, but her parish church would not allow her to be buried in their grounds because she was married to a Hindu and did not live a Christian life.

"The act of church was awful," Chopra said, according to The Indian Express. "But we should not concentrate on it. Rather we should look that we lost a family member."

According to Gulf News, the last wish of Mary John Akhauri, 94, was to be buried at the cemetery of her parish church. However, the St. John Attamangalam Church in Kumarakom, Kerala denied her family permission to have her buried in the Kumakarom Church grounds.

Father Simon Manuel of the Attamangalam Church, in a report by Times of India, said that they were following the church's constitution and traditions. Akhauri married a Hindu, and she is said to have not lived a life according to Christian teachings. The issue, he said, became news because she was the grandmother of Chopra, but he claimed that the church members are more important than the Bollywood actress.

Fr. Paul Thellakkat, former spokesman of KCBC, said that the Catholic church can refuse such burial only if a member was previously "expelled."

"But it is the rule of the catholic church," he said.  

However, not everyone agrees. Bishop Thomas Mar Thimothios said that a funeral rite is a spiritual act, and the Attamangalam Church's action was "non-Christian."

"The decision not to allow her funeral to be held at the Church was wrong," he said.

Akhauri's funeral was reportedly held at the St. Thomas Jacobite Church at Ponkunnam. The Indian Express reports that she was buried on Sunday in a graveyard in Kerala.