Ethiopia’s northern Tigray State is considering adopting a new law that would restrict Christian activities to within official church compounds, rendering illegalthe activities of smaller churches that do not own their own buildings and gather in houses.
The law, if passed, would most affect Christians from outside the Ethiopian Orthodox Church because any church that wanted to have its own land would need to prove that it had at least 6,000 members – a greater number than the totalpopulation of non-Orthodox Christians in the state.
The lawwould also ban Christians from evangelising outside of church compounds. Localchurch leaders have raised their concerns about the lawwith the state government but have yet to receive a reply. A similar lawwas recently ratified in neighbouring Amhara State which, togetherwith Tigray, is home to most members of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church, and localchurch leaders fear other states willcopy the move.