Christianity in Eritrea

In 2002, Isaias Afwerki, the president of Eritrea, declared all independent Protestant Churches enemies of the state.

Abune Antonios was elected on 5 March 2004, and enthroned as the third Patriarch of Orthodox Tewahedo Church of Eritrea on 2004-04-24.

In August 2005, the Patriarch of Orthodox Tewahedo Church of Eritrea, Abune Antonios, was confined to a strictly ceremonial role.

In a letter dated 2006-01-13 Patriarch Abune Antonios was informed that following several sessions of the church's Holy Synod, he had been formally deposed.

In 1839, Saint Justin de Jacobis arrived in the country as Prefect Apostolic of Ethiopia, in charge therefore of a Latin Church jurisdiction.

[citation needed] The Latin Church had become established in the south of Ethiopia in areas that had not been Christian and that were incorporated into the modern country only at the end of the nineteenth century.

The Italian occupation of Ethiopia in 1936 gave rise to an increase in the number of Latin Church jurisdictions, but the expulsion of foreign missionaries at the end of the Second World War meant that the Ethiopic Rite clergy had to take responsibility for larger areas than before.

Ten years later, on 9 April 1961, an Ethiopic metropolia (ecclesiastical province) was established, with Addis Ababa as the metropolitan see and Asmara (in Eritrea) and Adigrat (in Ethiopia) as suffragan eparchies.

In 1995, two new eparchies, Barentu and Keren, were established in Eritrea, and the Latin Church apostolic vicariate was abolished.

[10] According to the Barnabas Fund, in April 2010 a 28-year-old student died after she was held in a metal shipping container for 2 years, after being arrested for attending a Protestant Bible study.

Eritrea is included in the Episcopal Area of the Horn of Africa of the Anglican Diocese of Egypt, though there are no current congregations in the country.