The three archbishops were accused of illegally ordaining (one of the appointees repented before the Synod passed the decision) and, in so doing, breaking the ecclesiastical dogma of the church and the laws of Fetha Negest (‘Justice of the Kings’), a legal code first compiled by the Coptic Orthodox Church in Egypt and then adopted, adapted and expanded by the Ethiopian Orthodox Church in the 15th century AD. Although the current constitution of the country states that there is no state religion in Ethiopia, EOTC remains de jure state church. Instrumentalisation of EOTCFrom the introduction of Christianity in Ethiopia until 1974, the Ethiopian church and the state were two sides of the same coin. During the war in Tigray, the archbishop of Tigray declared the separation of the Tigray Orthodox Church from EOTC. This ideology had been preserved and promoted mainly by the northerners (Amharas, Tigreans, Agaws etc) whose ethnic identities came to be intertwined with the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Christianity.

Source: Ethiopian News February 04, 2023 12:06 UTC