Father Jeyanesan faces international arrest warrant

Uduvil Girls College Principal Shiranee Mills guilty of perjury
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“Unfortunately for the Rev Jeyanesan, when he lost his quest for the bishopric and faced with having to account for funds he had collected overseas in the name of the JDCSI believed to be running into millions and unaccounted for several years, he appears to have come out with the idea of launching his own church.”
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by Victor Karunairajan

(April 03, Toronto, Sri Lanka Guardian) A court in Sri Lanka has issued an open warrant for the arrest of Father Sellathurai Jeyanesan, the head of the Church of the American Ceylon Mission (CACM) for contempt of court. An earlier warrant for arrest has now been changed to criminal contempt of court and with this, he could be arrested anywhere in the world. The order was made by the District Judge R T Wignarajah of Jaffna.

Father Sellathurai Jeyanesan has failed to appear in court for the fourth successive time in an action brought against his Church of the American Ceylon Mission (CACM) by the Jaffna Diocese of the Church of South India (JDCSI). In their action, the JDCSI has stated that (a) persons who constitute the American Ceylon Mission (ACM) are the Bishop, Secretary and Treasurer respectively of the JDCSI and (b) the Wider Churches Ministries of the United Church of Christ (WCM-UCC) in the USA or anyone acting on their behalf or the servants or agents have no right or authority in law to appoint and or approve the officers of the ACM.

Earlier an Enjoining Order was issued restraining the defendants cited in this case including the Reverend Jeyanesan or any other person claiming under them from asserting in any manner whatsoever any function or power over the ACM and or using the ACM’s name in any manner whatsoever or howsoever.

When the case was taken up Monday March 31, 2008, Father Jeyanesan was reported absent. In the same case on the following day, Uduvil Girls College Principal Shiranee Mills was found guilty of perjury and was released on a bail of Rs.50,000. She was ordered not to leave her station. The proceedings will be resumed April 21, 2008. Introduced as a witness for the defendants by their counsel, Shiranee Mills was proved as having committed perjury on three counts. Another defendant, the Rev Milton Solomons was bailed on the basis of having provided two sureties.

The plaintiffs were represented by Attorneys-at-Law M A Sumanthiran assisted by Hamsana Vamadeva, Sithy Ermiza Tegel and Gehan Gunatilake and instructed by A Rajaratnam and V T Sivalingam.

The action instituted by the JDCSI was necessitated consequent to a letter by Dr Cally Rogers-Witte, the Executive Minister of the Wider Churches Ministries of the United Church of Christ (WCM-UCC), the successors to the United Church Board for World Missions (UCBWM), who had taken the view that her organization still had control over the ACM properties in Sri Lanka and that the JDCSI had no status; both stands had no credibility whatsoever.

Unfortunately for the Rev Jeyanesan, when he lost his quest for the bishopric and faced with having to account for funds he had collected overseas in the name of the JDCSI believed to be running into millions and unaccounted for several years, he appears to have come out with the idea of launching his own church.

In this he has attempted to use the original identity of the American Ceylon Mission in Sri Lanka to give it an appearance of credibility. He probably believed this will have a popular appeal in the US especially in the missionary circles and more particularly with the WCM-UCC and the Trustees of Jaffna College Funds an independent fiduciary institution, and proceeded to occupy some of the properties of the JDCSI and claim them as belonging to the CACM.

He did have the support and encouragement of the WCM-UCC which had no legal or moral right whatsoever to extend that to him. The marauding Spanish colonialists used such “Appropriation by Occupation” tactics in South America and the Philippines five centuries ago.

Dr Cally Rogers-Witte’s ill-conceived letter of July 2007 and perhaps ill-advised too, has caused considerable problems to the JDCSI in particular and the Christian community in general. Before writing this letter, she should have consulted with the Church of South India in Chennai, South India, the church to which the JDCSI belongs. The ACM was conjoined to the South India United Church early 1900 and in 1947, totally vested in their successors, the JDCSI.

In this respect Dr Rogers-Witte totally overlooked the ideals of the missionary enterprise, its progress over the decades and how it has developed into a full-fledged indigenous church in southern Asia. That she, even more as the Executive Minister of the WCM-UCC, should have supported a split in the JDCSI in favour of a rebel over an issue that was most unbecoming for a Christian priest, has caused an indelible stain on mission enterprise.

Father Jeyanesan’s has never been transparent with his financial affairs and how he manages them. He has been on several fund raising campaigns while he was in the employ of the JDCSI. One US media headline said: “Rev Jeyanesan tours North America to raise awareness and support for victims of war.”

A US family believed he was a kind of liaison between the Government of Sri Lanka and the LTTE trying to bring about a solution in the country. There are organizations that demand reports on management of the funds they have bestowed but as long as the real beneficiary which was the JDCSI in this case, Father Jeyanesan perhaps believed he need not have to worry about submitting reports to the donors.

Once the Rt Rev Dr Daniel Thiagarajah became the Bishop of the Jaffna Diocese of the Church of South India, Father Jeyanesan knew, unlike with the previous heads he served who appear to have overlooked many of his iniquities, he was faced with having to submit all records and instruments of the financial matters he handled and also the accounts.

In this respect, it is contextual to note that even the former treasurer of the JDCSI, Annappah Jeyarajan has also joined Father Jeyanesan and his CACM camp and he too has not submitted the instruments, records and even the funds that rightfully belong to the JDCSI. A popular speculation in the JDCSI community is that it was this dilemma and predicament that led Father Jeyanesan to split from the JDCSI entertaining, no doubt, the hope that the WCM-UCC in Cleveland, Ohio, USA would come to their help if not rescue.
- Sri Lanka Guardian