This article delves into the intricate history of Catholicism in Ethiopia, examining the impact of foreign interventions, specifically those by Jesuit missionaries and Italy, on the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church (EOTC). Many foreign countries and individuals interfered in the affairs of the EOTC.
The focus is on the divisive legacies resulting from these interventions. The intrusions of Italy and the Jesuit missionaries are the most vivid cases. Thus, the main objective of this paper is to explore the interventions of the so-called Jesuit missionaries and Italy in the EOTC in the 16th and 17th centuries and the late 19th and 20th centuries, respectively, and some of their legacies in the contemporary EOTC.
It concludes that the current contradictory and divisive religious teachings in the EOTC were initiated and originated by the Jesuit missionaries, and the ethnocentric tendency and ethnic-based division of top ecclesiastics of the current EOTC are the legacies of Italy. Currently, such divisions are consolidated and celebrated by Ethiopians, including the top authorities of the EOTC, but at least in part, their source is foreign intervention.
The EOTC was a promoter of Ethiopian unity and the engine of Ethiopia's independence. It is one of the oldest churches in the world and has continuously existed in a close relationship with the Ethiopian monarchy for more than sixteen hundred years.
Exploring foreign intervention in the EOTC is essential for many reasons. One of the primary advantages of studying such an issue is to identify the legacies that foreign intervention has left in the EOTC. Besides, this article seeks to contribute to our understanding of how foreign legacies become the roots of African socio-political and economic problems, using the EOTC as a litmus test.
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The Ethiopian Orthodox Church Explained
Conceptual Insights and Research Method
In the political history of Africa, foreign intervention is mainly associated with colonialism. Western states used various methods to interfere in African states. For example, historically, the civilizing mission was one of the methods. In this regard, Mazrui noted that in earlier years, European colonialism was portrayed as a civilizing force in Africa, Asia, and the non-Western world.
The civilizing mission underlined the desirability of reforming and restructuring non-western societies according to the European model. It is what Amin calls “Eurocentrism”. For Eurocentrists, the other races and cultures appear immature, barbarous, and underdeveloped. Eurocentrists saw their values as the only and highest standard of civilization. For example, European Christianity was considered a measure of civilization.
This article used a qualitative research approach. It employed both primary and secondary sources of data. Letters, autobiographies, and reports are among the primary data collected for this study. These sources of data are directly obtained from the owners themselves.
In relation to the intrusion of missionaries and their legacies, for example, there are letters that Jesuit missionaries used to write to their principals. Some letters were translated from Latin into English language by scholars. This article used such translated works. In addition to these letters, it used personal biographies written by Catholic monks of the time as additional primary sources.
The study then examines how the current situation in the EOTC is related to the legacies of Jesuit missionaries and Italy. The researcher carefully sorted the relevant works to answer the main objective of the study. The findings were analyzed using thematic analysis in accordance with the objectives of the article.
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The Jesuit Missionaries' Intervention and its Legacies
In the second half of the fifteenth and early sixteenth centuries, European powers such as Portugal were more eager than ever to engage with the Christians of the Horn of Africa. Indeed, European travellers, explorers, and envoys had been traveling to Ethiopia before the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries. However, these groups had not brought Europe and Ethiopia into contact.
At the beginning, European elites identified Ethiopia with the distant Christian land of Prester John, the pious king capable of rescuing Christianity from the looming Islamic threat. They assumed that Ethiopia was a powerful Christian country that could be their friend outside of Europe. As a result, some European states, such as Portugal, wanted to have diplomatic relations with Ethiopia.
The diplomatic relations between Ethiopia and Portugal became strong after the involvement of the Jesuit missionaries in Ethiopia. Before the Jesuit missionaries' intrusion, their relationships were limited to personal exchanges and letters. Including the pre-Jesuit mission, the Jesuits' mission in Ethiopia has four episodes: the pre-Jesuit mission (1520-1544); the first mission of the Jesuits (1557-1577); the second mission of the Jesuits (1603-1622); and the third mission of the Jesuits (1625-1633).
The pre-Jesuit missionaries who entered Ethiopia did not tightly challenge the canons, dogmas, and related values of the EOTC. They had worked hard to bring the Portuguese government into contact with Ethiopia. These missionaries were telling the kings of Portugal, in particular, that Ethiopian Christians were surrounded by Muslim enemies.
Ahmad Ibn Ibrihim Al-Ghazi's atrocities against Ethiopian Christians, especially between 1529 and 1540, created a unique situation for Ethiopian-Portuguese diplomatic relations. Despite the delay, Portugal responded positively to the king's call. In the 1540s, four hundred Portuguese fighters arrived in Ethiopia.
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In 1543, the Portuguese-backed Christian Gelawdewos and the Turkish-backed Ahmad fought a final battle at Wayna Daga. In this battle, the Portuguese-backed Christian army defeated Ahmad. After the war, Portuguese troops began to live in Ethiopia. They were also allowed to marry Ethiopian women. Ethiopian monks living abroad were also given a place to live in Rome.
However, the euphoria was not sustained for long. The catholic missionaries began to intrude in the affairs of the EOTC. After the war, a catholic man Bermudez was promoting the Portuguese demand on Ethiopia. Bermudez's question was also what the first Jesuit missionaries asked Emperor Gelawdewos after they entered Ethiopia in 1557.
Italian Intervention
Catholic missionaries arrived in Ethiopia in the 14th century, and Pope Eugenius IV sent a letter to the Ethiopian Emperor on August 28, 1439, inviting him to unity with the Catholic Church, but such efforts were unsuccessful. In the 16th century, Islamic attacks, culminating in 1531, threatened the very existence of Christian Ethiopia. The Portuguese in Ethiopia were accompanied by Jesuit missionaries, who began an effort to bring the Ethiopian Orthodox Church into union with the Catholic Church. They focused their activity on the political elite of the country including the Emperor himself.
Largely through the efforts of Fr. Peter Paez, Emperor Susenyos converted and declared Catholicism the state religion in 1622. The following year Pope Gregory XV appointed another Portuguese Jesuit, Affonso Mendez, as Patriarch of the Ethiopian Church. A formal union was declared when Mendez arrived in the country in 1626. But this union was to last only ten years.
Mendez imposed a series of latinizations on the Ethiopian liturgy, customs, and discipline, which Susenyos then tried to enforce with cruelty and bloodshed. This led to a violent public reaction. Susenyos died in 1632. In 1636 his successor expelled Mendez, dissolved the union, and either expelled or executed the Catholic missionaries. The country was closed to Catholic missionary activity for the next 200 years.
In 1839 limited activity was resumed by the Lazarists and Capuchins, but public hostility was still very strong. It was only with the accession of King Menelik II to the throne in 1889 that Catholic missionaries could again work freely in the country.
Catholic missionary activity expanded in Ethiopia during the Italian occupation from 1935 to 1941, as it had earlier in Eritrea which had been under Italian control since 1889.
In 1961 a metropolitan see was established at Addis Ababa with suffragan dioceses in Asmara (Eritrea) and Adigrat. After Eritrea achieved independence on May 24, 1993, about half the faithful found themselves in that new country. In 1995 Pope John Paul II created two new dioceses in Eritrea at Keren and Barentu, and in 2003 he established the diocese of Emdeber, Ethiopia. On January 19, 2015, Pope Francis created a separate metropolitan church for Eritrea and a new eparchy in Ethiopia at Bahir Dar-Dessie.
Until 2015, the Catholic bishops of Ethiopia and Eritrea composed a single episcopal conference with headquarters in Addis Ababa. In both countries all the jurisdictions are geographical, and include worshipping communities of both the Latin and Ethiopian traditions.
The four dioceses in central and northern Ethiopia generally use the Ethiopian (Ge’ez) rite, and fall under the jurisdiction of the Oriental Congregation. In southern Ethiopia there are five Apostolic Vicariates and two Apostolic Prefectures mostly of the Latin rite with about 500,000 faithful under the jurisdiction of the Congregation for the Evangelization of Peoples.
In Ethiopia all the major seminarians attend the Capuchin Franciscan Institute of Philosophy and Theology in Addis Ababa, except those from the diocese of Adigrat, which has its own major seminary.
In 1919 Pope Benedict XV founded the Pontifical Ethiopian College within the Vatican walls and designated St. Stephen’s Church directly behind St.
The Eastern Rite Ethiopian Catholic Church, the primary Catholic rite in the country, bases its liturgy and teaching on that of the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church, modified to be in accordance with the Catholic dogma. While separated by their understanding of the primacy of the Bishop of Rome and their Christology, the Ethiopian Catholic and Orthodox Churches have basically the same sacraments and liturgy.
Between the 13th and 18th centuries, the Roman Catholic Church sent various missions to Ethiopia. Most of these were directed less at the conversion of non-Christians, but at securing the adhesion to the Holy See of the existing Church.
The Portuguese voyages of discovery at the end of the fifteenth century opened the way for direct contacts between the Church in Rome and the Church in Ethiopia. In the mid-16th century, Ethiopian rulers allowed Jesuits to proselytize in the country. From 1839 Msgr. Justin de Jacobis, and subsequently Cardinal Guglielmo Massaia, resumed Catholic missionary activities.
The following table provides a summary of the key periods and events in the history of Catholicism in Ethiopia:
| Period | Events |
|---|---|
| 14th Century | Catholic missionaries arrive in Ethiopia. |
| 16th Century | Jesuit missionaries attempt to unite the Ethiopian Orthodox Church with the Catholic Church. Emperor Susenyos converts to Catholicism in 1622, but the union is short-lived. |
| 1839 | Limited Catholic activity resumes with Lazarists and Capuchins. |
| 1889 | Catholic missionaries work freely after King Menelik II ascends to the throne. |
| 1935-1941 | Catholic missionary activity expands during the Italian occupation. |
| 1961 | A metropolitan see is established in Addis Ababa. |
| 1993-2015 | New dioceses are created in Eritrea and Ethiopia, and a separate metropolitan church is established for Eritrea. |
Despite its location in the midst of a band of Muslim countries in the Horn of Africa, Ethiopia stands out as a country whose identity has been defined by a rich, ancient and quite distinctive Ethiopian Orthodox Christian heritage. Colonialist, Latinizing efforts by the Jesuits in the 16th century and an Italian political occupation under the Mussolini regime complicate the standing of Catholicism in the country.
Catholics interviewed in Ethiopia described their Church as less restrictive and more “modern” than the Orthodox Church, and seem to appreciate the degree to which their Church bridges the modern and the traditional. At the same time, when asked whether they saw the primary role of the faith as liberal or as conservative of good social norms, all of the interviewees, even among highly educated urbanites, saw the role of the Church in the latter terms.
Ethiopia, as he described it, is a place where Catholicism is a religion of practice more than it is a place where people emphasize reflection on the meaning of practice. Ethiopians were tied to faith deeply, but the kinds of theological questions that preoccupied Germans were not to be noticed in Ethiopia.
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