While abbot of the Monastery of Saint Anthony, he was sent to Ethiopia at the request of Peter VII to mediate between Abouna Salama and his opponents in the Ethiopian Church, as well as "prevent the sympathies for the Catholic missionaries and their teaching from increasing further."

The former Ichege Gebre Mariam, who was in Cairo to press for the Ethiopian rights to the convent in Jerusalem, used this opportunity to exert pressure for his cause.

[2] As Patriarch, Cyril returned to Ethiopia at the request of viceroy Sa'id of Egypt, the first recorded visit by the head of the Coptic church to that country.

Emperor Tewodros II, whom Trimingham described as "unable to conceive how a Christian prelate could consent to act as the envoy of a Muslim prince",[3] received Pope Cyril unfavorably in December 1856.

Sven Rubenson records that when the Patriarch expressed an interest in reviewing the Emperor's army, Tewodros II suspected him of being a spy, and confined him with Abouna Salama to their house; only after the Ethiopian clergy intervened, were both men released.