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Orthodoxy in Africa

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One of the consequences of the [[schism|split]] was divided missions being sent to Nubia, where the Northern and Southern kingdoms were evangelised by non-Chalcedonian missionaries sponsored by the Empress St [[Theodora (wife of Justinian)|Theodora]], and the central kingdom was evangelised by a Chalcedonian mission sponsored by the Emperor St [[Justinian the Great|Justinian I]]. The rivalry between the missions meant that they also used Greek and Coptic as liturgical languages, and did not follow the principle of translating into the vernacular. The result was that the Nubian Church eventually disappeared in about the 15th century, and the people (in what is today Sudan) became Muslims. The [[Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church|Ethiopian Church]] was more successful, but it was aligned to the Coptic group, and remained so aligned after the schism.
In the 7th century Muslim Arabs invaded North Africa, and conquered it, which made Christians, after 300 years of freedom, second-class citizens. The church in North-West Africa (today [[Tunisia ]] and [[Morocco]]), which looked to Rome and the West for leadership, disappeared even faster than the church in Nubia. Only the Christians in Ethiopia remained free.
The [[Church of Alexandria|Orthodox Patriarchate of Alexandria]], then, like those of [[Church of Antioch|Antioch]] and [[Church of Jerusalem|Jerusalem]], could not do much more than hold on. Mission was out of the question in a society in which the [[conversion]] of a Muslim to Christianity was punishable by death. Most of the conversions went the other way.
In the 19th century things began to change. Large numbers of Greeks settled in Alexandria, which helped to revitalize the Church there. Also Greek and Syrian traders began settling in other parts of Africa, establishing Orthodox communities. At the same time, Western missionaries, both [[Roman Catholic Church|Roman Catholic]] and [[Protestantism|Protestant]], began evangelising in [[Orthodoxy in Sub-Saharan Africa|sub-Saharan Africa]]. Some Africans who had become Christian, however, began studying Church history, and discovered that the [[Orthodox Church]] was the original one, and therefore sought to become Orthodox. Different groups in East and West Africa made such discoveries independently of each other, and sought to be united to the [[Church of Alexandria|Patriarchate of Alexandria]]. This led to a great growth in Orthodoxy around Lake Victoria, in [[Uganda]], Kenya and Tanzania, and later in other parts of tropical Africa as well, especially in the second half of the 20th century.
Patriarch [[Petros VII (Papapetrou) of Alexandria|Pope Petros VII]], who was elected in 1997, actively encouraged mission until his untimely death in a helicopter crash on [[September 11]], 2004, along with three other bishops, including Bishop [[Nektarios (Kellis) of Madagascar|Nektarios]], a pioneer missionary in [[Madagascar]]. The new Patriarch, His Beatitude Pope [[Theodoros II (Choreftakis) of Alexandria|Theodoros]], himself has missionary experience, having been Archbishop of Cameroun and later [[Zimbabwe]].
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