{"id":291551,"date":"2019-04-30T03:00:00","date_gmt":"2019-04-30T07:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/?guid=3a8833803f07173c4acd28ea747dfeff"},"modified":"2026-09-17T11:33:39","modified_gmt":"2026-09-17T15:33:39","slug":"welt-ethiopias-rock-hewn-churches-were-cut-into-stone-against-invaders","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/291551","title":{"rendered":"WELT: Ethiopia\u2019s rock-hewn churches were cut into stone against invaders"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>In April 2019 Germany\u2019s WELT travel desk walked readers through Ethiopia\u2019s northern rock churches, calling the country Africa\u2019s Christian cradle and lingering on labyrinthine passages cut into red stone before pilgrims remove their shoes for a priest\u2019s Selam.<\/p>\n<img data-recalc-dims=\"1\" height=\"780\" width=\"780\" class=\"aligncenter size-large wp-image-601434\" src=\"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/09\/amhara-lalibela-1280.jpg?fit=780%2C780&#038;ssl=1\" alt=\"WELT: Ethiopia\u2019s rock-hewn churches were cut into stone against invaders\" \/>\n<p>Eighty-eight-year-old priest Mezemr Alemu, leaning on a prayer staff in a white kaftan, became the human hinge of the piece. The architecture lesson was older: temples carved down into rock rather than built up, harder for invading armies to spot and erase.<\/p>\n<p>Lalibela and related highland sanctuaries are not only tourism inventory. They are living liturgy, Ge\u2019ez memory, and a reminder that Ethiopian Christianity predates many European cathedrals tourists treat as default sacred space.<\/p>\n<p>As culture\/history reference, the WELT file keeps European attention on carved faith rather than on Abiy Ahmed\u2019s airport diplomacy. Stone outlasts press conferences.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Sources:<\/strong> <a href=\"https:\/\/www.welt.de\/reise\/Fern\/article192410073\/Aethiopien-Kirchen-wurden-zum-Schutz-vor-Invasoren-in-den-Fels-gemeisselt.html\">WELT<\/a><\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>\u00c4thiopien: Kirchen wurden zum Schutz vor Invasoren in den Fels gemei\u00dfelt&nbsp;&nbsp;WELT<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":30,"featured_media":601434,"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-291551","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\/2026\/09\/amhara-lalibela-1280.jpg?fit=1280%2C720&ssl=1","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p9NivD-1dQr","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/291551","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\/30"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=291551"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/291551\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":602505,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/291551\/revisions\/602505"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/601434"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=291551"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=291551"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.com\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=291551"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}