Meserete Kristos Church
Meserete Kristos Church is a Mennonite denomination in Ethiopia and Eritrea (P'ent'ay/Evangelical). It is a member of the Mennonite World Conference. The headquarters are in Addis Ababa.
History
[edit]The Church has its origins in an American mission of the Lancaster Mennonite Conference in the 1940s. [1] The first church was founded in 1951 in Addis Ababa. Meserete Kristos Church (meaning "Christ is the foundation Church", based on I Cor. 3:11) was officially founded in 1959. [2] According to a census published in 2022, it would have 1160 churches and 370,909 baptized members.[3]
In 2005, Amnesty International reported the church experienced religious persecution in Eritrea, where it had been present for decades.[4]
Meserete Kristos College
[edit]The college was located in Addis Ababa until January 2007. Since its founding in 1994, the college has produced 262 graduates,[5] and had 110 full-time and 42 part-time students enrolled in the fall of 2006.[6] Construction of a permanent campus in Bishoftu is underway.[7] In January 2007, all physical assets were moved to the new campus, and classes began there on February 6. The five-story education building, the first of 11 planned buildings, is half-completed, and currently houses all classrooms, academic offices, library, and language and computer labs. A men's residence was completed in 2010. Negash Kebede was installed as College President on 11 March 2007.[5] Kiros Teka Haddis was installed as President on September 12, 2012.[8] Fall 2014 enrollment at the college was 214 students (183 male, 31 female).[9] Currently the President of Meserete Kiristos church is Pastor Desalegn Abebe.
See also
[edit]Notes
[edit]- ^ Girma Bekele, The In-Between People: A Reading of David Bosch through the Lens of Mission History and Contemporary Challenges In Ethiopia, Wipf and Stock Publishers, USA, 2011, p. 225
- ^ Girma Bekele, The In-Between People: A Reading of David Bosch through the Lens of Mission History and Contemporary Challenges In Ethiopia, Wipf and Stock Publishers, USA, 2011, p. 225
- ^ Mennonite World Conference, Global map, mwc-cmm.org, Canada, retrieved September 19, 2022
- ^ "Eritrea:Religious Persecution". Amnesty International. December 7, 2005. p. 5.
- ^ a b Meserete Kristos College Newsletter (May 2007).
- ^ "Meserete Kristos College moves in," The Mennonite, 15 May 2007
- ^ "Meserete Kristos College". Archived from the original on 2019-08-30. Retrieved 2006-05-25.
- ^ Meserete Kristos College Newsletter (September 2012).
- ^ Meserete Kristos College Newsletter (December 2014): 1.
Relevant literature
[edit]- Mashas, Andrew. 2017. Buried we will grow. Anabaptist Witness. Article about MKC for American audience
- Hege, Nathan B. 1998. Beyond Our Prayers: Anabaptist Church Growth in Ethiopia, 1948–1998. (Scottdale, PA: Herald).
External links
[edit]- Mennonite World Review's articles on the history and growth of the Meserete Kristos Church
- Meserete Kristos Church at Global Anabaptist Mennonite Encyclopedia Online
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