Together with Mathews Mar Athanasius Metropolitan, he led the reformation activities in the Malankara Church after the passing away of Abraham Malpan including the establishment of prayer meetings, vernacular worship and Holy Communion in Malayalam as well as the publication of translated and revised Syriac Liturgy in Malayalam, all of which led to the eventual formation of the Mar Thoma Church.
He was born to his father K. T. Iype who was a timber merchant and his mother Mariamma who was the daughter of P. I. Punoose son of Ittycheria of the Pulimoottil family in Thiruvalla.
In 1861, K. I. Thoma received holy ordination as a priest, from Euyakim Mar Coorilos the Patriarchal delegate Metropolitan sent from Antioch, at his home parish, the Thiruvalla Paliyakara St. George Church.
However, this was not acceptable to the congregation (including his father and family members) who, except for a handful of visionary people, largely opposed Achen's actions and lodged a complaint to the Metropolitan in 1869.
[2] However, the Metropolitan did not take any disciplinary action and offered a solution that a wall be built at the east side of the church so that Achen can conduct the qurbana there.
Under his supervision, a formal accounting system with book keeping was established to manage the church finances in a proper manner.
In 1872, after getting approval from Mathews Mar Athanasius Metropolitan, this revised Liturgy was formally published in Malayalam and printed at CMS Press, Kottayam.
[6] This sum was raised from a generous endowment made from Puthencavu Mathilakam Arohanam Mar Thoma Church out of the Rs.
1000 that they had received as severance pay in lieu of relinquishing their claims upon separating from their pre-reformation home parish St. Mary's Orthodox Cathedral, Puthencavu in 1900.
[2][6] His son Abraham (1898 – 1978) was a professor and rationalist who became famous through his campaign to expose various Indian and Sri Lankan "god-men" and so-called paranormal phenomena as frauds.
[12][13] His younger son, Behanan was a renowned sociologist and psychologist, who earned Ph.D. in psychology from Yale in 1934[14] and had performed pioneering scientific appraisal on Yoga that was published as a book[15] and made popular to the western world through visual coverage in the LIFE magazine in 1937.