{"id":230278,"date":"2018-08-01T14:29:50","date_gmt":"2018-08-01T18:29:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/?guid=3a67b3c0b156e81585a806c4e6107aae"},"modified":"2019-02-09T13:55:57","modified_gmt":"2019-02-09T18:55:57","slug":"ethiopias-exiled-orthodox-church-patriarch-returns-home-after-27-years","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/230278","title":{"rendered":"Ethiopia&#8217;s exiled Orthodox church patriarch returns home after 27 years"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>BBC &#8211; The exiled patriarch of Ethiopia&#8217;s powerful Orthodox Church, Abune Merkorios, has returned home to the capital, Addis Ababa, after 27 years.<\/p>\n<p>Ethiopia&#8217;s reformist Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed met him in the U.S. last week and persuaded him to reconcile with a rival faction of the church.<\/p>\n<p><img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/pbs.twimg.com\/media\/Djg8F1XXsAA1aJz.jpg?w=780&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"\" \/><\/p>\n<p>He was greeted by his followers, who sang and ululated in welcome.<\/p>\n<p>VIDEO<br \/>\n<iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/plugins\/video.php?href=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.facebook.com%2Fmereja.media%2Fvideos%2F2052925671406929%2F&#038;show_text=0&#038;width=560\" width=\"560\" height=\"315\" style=\"border:none;overflow:hidden\" scrolling=\"no\" frameborder=\"0\" allowTransparency=\"true\" allowFullScreen=\"true\"><\/iframe><\/p>\n<p>The church split in the early 1990s after Mengistu Haile Mariam&#8217;s communist regime was overthrown.<\/p>\n<p>Politics and the church are closely intertwined in Ethiopia &#8211; and Abune Merkorios was perceived to represent the diaspora and opposition in exile.<\/p>\n<p>As there are now two patriarchs, Abune Merkorios will be responsible for the spiritual aspects of the church, while Abune Mathyas will be in charge of the day-to-day affairs.<\/p>\n<p>The reunification of the church signals that PM Abiy, who became prime minister in April, is succeeding in his efforts to promote reconciliation among Ethiopians, reports BBC Amharic&#8217;s Kalkidan Yibeltal from Addis Ababa.<\/p>\n<p>The Ethiopian Orthodox Church can trace its roots back to the fourth century &#8211; and is one of the oldest organized Christian bodies in the world. It used to be part of Egypt&#8217;s Coptic Christian Church, but appointed its own patriarch in 1959.<\/p>\n<p>Bishop Merkorios was forced to abdicate after the Ethiopian People&#8217;s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) overthrew the communist regime of Mengistu Haile Mariam in 1991.<\/p>\n<p>His followers objected, saying the position of patriarch is held for life. The cleric escaped to the US, where a synod in exile was established.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>BBC &#8211; The exiled patriarch of Ethiopia&#8217;s powerful Orthodox Church, Abune Merkorios, has returned home to the capital, Addis Ababa, after 27 years. Ethiopia&#8217;s reformist Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed met him in the U.S. last week and persuaded him to reconcile with a rival faction of the church. He was greeted by his followers, who [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":230310,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"advanced_seo_description":"","jetpack_seo_html_title":"","jetpack_seo_noindex":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[8],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-230278","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-ethiopian-news"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/08\/Abune-Merkorios-returns-home.jpg?fit=1151%2C645&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9NivD-XUa","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/230278","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=230278"}],"version-history":[{"count":6,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/230278\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":230314,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/230278\/revisions\/230314"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/230310"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=230278"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=230278"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=230278"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}