Abraham Petros I Ardzivian, 

1st Catholicos-Patriarch of the

Armenian Catholic Church

His Gratitude Abraham Petros I Ardzivain started his religious vocation as a priest in the Armenian Apostolic Church, an Oriental Orthodox Church. In. The year 1710, he was ordained as the Armenian Orthodox Bishop of Aleppo by the Catholicos of the Holy See of Cilicia (the Armenian Catholicosate of the Great House of Cilicia).

After his conversion to Roman Catholicism, His Beatitude was persecuted, imprisoned and exiled, in different Ottoman prisons. In 1714, many Armenian converts to Roman Catholicism decided to congregate independently under the leadership of Bishops Melkon Tazbazian and Abraham Ardzivian, with both being in prison. Tazbazian died in prison and Ardzivian, being liberated briefly was imprisoned again on Rouad Island from 1719 to 1721. After liberation and residing briefly in Aleppo, he took refuge in voluntary exile in Lebanon at Kreim, near Ghosta, Keserwan, Lebanon.

The Armenian Catholic Mouradian brothers of Aleppo bought an estate to found an Armenian Catholic convent in Kreim where Ardzivian resided. He founded the Kreim convent and St-Antoine's Armenian Catholic Monks order. After two decades in Lebanon, he returned to his eparchy of Aleppo in 1739 after one year of the establishment of the eparchy in 1738.

Because his people desired to return to full communion with the Church of Rome, he was ordained the Armenian Catholic Bishop of Aleppo by Greek Catholic bishops in 1739 and voted in and declared the first Catholicos-Patriarch of the Armenian Catholic Church on November 26, 1740. This was ratified by Pope Benedict XIV after a meeting of the Cardinals in Rome on November 26, 1742. The Pope also granted him the Pallium ( a wool garment which recognizes him as having full Metropolitan Archbishop jurisdiction and patriarchal authority).

Upon his return, to Lebanon, he served as Catholicos-Patriarch aided by 6 clergy and a number of Armenian Catholic monks, dieing in 1749. He was succeeded by Hagop Petros II Hovsepian.

Holding hands with the Armenian Catholic Church Patriarchate, the Orthodox Catholic Church of Trinidad and Tobago shares the apostolic succession of St Jude and st. Bartholomew the apostles.