Gondar - Phi Kappa Psi

New York Alpha’s intellectual and brother Paez’s
predecessor, brother Oviedo served God
and Emperor Susenyos of Ethiopia . . .
Andrés de Oviedo was born in
Illescas, Spain, about 1517, he entered the
Society in Rome in 1541. After his studies he
was appointed (1545) rector of the Jesuit
college at Gandía, and it was he who led
Francisco de Borja through his novitiate and
received his vows on February 1, 1548. In
1550 Oviedo travelled to Rome with the duke
and participated in the discussions on the
Constitutions. He became (1551) rector of the
new college in Naples and was later assigned
to the mission in Ethiopia. He was ordained
bishop on May 5, 1555, and became Patriarch
of Ethiopia on December 20, 1562. In Ethiopia
he lived amid extreme poverty; he died in
1577. The background to brother Oviedo’s
mission to Ethiopia lay in the divide occurring
as Islam moved west, absorbing early
Christian communities along the north coast
of Africa into the Caliphate. Ethiopia was cut
off from its Christian community.
The Arms of Gandia,
Kingdom of Spain
Communication between Rome and Abyssinia became more difficult, and
from the end of the eleventh to the beginning of the thirteenth century one could
see no bond existing between Abyssinia and the centre of Catholicism. The
Sovereign Pontiffs, nevertheless, have bestowed a constant solicitude on the
Christians of Ethiopia.
The first missionaries sent to their aid were the Dominicans, whose
success, however, roused the fanaticism of the Monophysites against them, and
caused their martyrdom. For more than a hundred years silence enfolded the
ruins of this Church. At a later period, the fame of the Crusades having spread,
pilgrim monks, on their return from Jerusalem, wakened once more, by what they
told in the Ethiopian court, the wish to be reunited to the Church.
The Acts of the Council of Florence tell of the embassy sent by the
Emperor Zéra-Jacob with the object of obtaining this result (1452). The union
was brought about; but on their home journey, the messengers, while passing
through Egypt, were given up to the schismatic Copts, and to the Caliph, and put
to death before they could bring the good news to their native land.