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Addis Ababa ETHIOPIA Overview |
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Director Elizabeth Sargent |
Ethiopia is a country rich in tradition and history. Claimed to be one of the oldest nations in the world, there are over 60 references to Ethiopia in the Bible. Christianity may have come to Ethiopia as early as the 1st century A.D. According to legend, the gospel was introduced by the high ranking court official of the Queen of Ethiopia whose conversion story is recorded in Acts 8:26-39. From the 4th century until the 1974 revolution, Christianity was the state religion of Ethiopia. However, under Mengistu’s Marxist regime Christians were severely persecuted, with many church buildings confiscated or destroyed and congregations scattered. Since the fall of Mengistu’s regime in 1991 there has been unprecedented freedom of worship and witness.
In the early 1960’s a small group of students at Haile Selassie University (now Addis Ababa University) met for fellowship and prayer. Over the next decade this movement would grow to become what is now the Evangelical Student Union of Ethiopia (EvaSUE). Communist persecution drove the work underground for fifteen years until the fall of the Marxist government in 1991. When the student groups re-emerged, there were 18 campus fellowships in the country. Today, a decade later, there are 45 groups and more than 3,000 university students who profess faith in Christ. Though their needs remain great, God has done much to prosper the movement.
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