Stone Cross
According to legend, in order to install a huge stone cross in the church, the devotees went to ask for help from an elephant owner who was staying in Puthupally some 6 kilometres (3.7 mi) distant. Since the elephant was resting and receiving treatment, the owner refused the request. The devotees returned in desperation and to their surprise saw the stone cross had been erected. It was properly installed and before the cross stood the elephant.
The traditional lamps lit around this cross by devotees are a peculiarity of the church. Devotees used to move around the cross on their knees after bathing in a pond. Psychiatric patients and chronically diseased patients praying beneath the cross for the restoration of their health is a common phenomena.
Read more about this topic: Manarcad Church
Famous quotes containing the words stone and/or cross:
“I passed a tomb among green shades
Where seven anemones with down-dropped heads
Wept tears of dew upon the stone beneath.”
—Unknown. The Thousand and One Nights.
AWP. Anthology of World Poetry, An. Mark Van Doren, ed. (Rev. and enl. Ed., 1936)
“The cross of the Legion of Honor has been conferred on me. However, few escape that distinction.”
—Mark Twain [Samuel Langhorne Clemens] (1835–1910)