Who We Are?
Debre Medhanit Medhane Alem Church was the first English-speaking parish of the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church established July 23, 1972 in Toronto, Canada. In accordance with the teachings of the Holy Fathers, the Holy Bible and our Mother Church. Debre Medhanit Medhane Alem provides liturgical, spiritual and cultural services that glorify God and our relationship to Him through the ancient richness of African Christianity as found in the living local traditions of the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church.
Our Mission
An English Parish of Love, Culture and Understanding
This ministry is dedicated to the glory of God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit, the Comforter. The Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church is orthodox in faith, doctrine teachings and in its traditions. It is under the leadership of His Holiness Abuna Mathias I and the Holy Synod of Ethiopia.
We are a parish church in nature, spreading the “Good news” of the Word of God as mentioned by our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ in St. Matthew 28:19-20 “Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit: teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world.”
Focusing on the love of God through spiritual growth in the Church where no one stands alone on their journey of faith towards the Kingdom of Haven
Love
Only you, O Love, prepare me for the true service of God. Christian love. What is Christian love?
The dictionary to consult here is our own hearts, “God is love.” Christian love is the feeling begotten in our hearts towards God and towards our fellow-men by the penetration into our hearts of the sense of the love of God to us when He gave His Only-begotten Son to die for us. Thus, God who is Love enters into union with man through the Son of His love and by the Spirit of love.”
- Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us, and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins … we love, because He first loved us. To live in this divine love is the spiritual life. That is at once the natural and the supernatural history of Christian love.
The mission the Church is to share Christian love with our members, community, neighbours and friends through nurturing support as we aspire to bring healing to the world through God’s Son the Saviour of the World Jesus Christ.
Culture
To communicate the spiritual riches of ancient African Christianity as found within the living and cultural traditions of the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church; over two thousand plus years of faith and worship to the One True God.
We from the Western Diaspora who have embraced this ancient culture of African Christianity finds its rich and inspiring traditions of worship has helped us to navigate our way through society’s cultural indifference to us as a people and infused in us a true worshipping spirit through the living cultural embrace of this ancient African faith.
After realizing what it is like to worship the One True God though the living and spiritual riches of the culture within the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church, we want to share that vital richness of African Christianity through knowledge with our members, neighbours, community to elevate ourselves through the culture and spiritual riches of African Christianity.
Understanding
Proverbs 3: 13-14 “Blessed is the one who finds wisdom, and the one who gets understanding, for the gain from her is better than gain from silver and her profit better than gold.”
Understanding is a gift from God to convert with soft hearts the Word of God and our willingness to obey. He who receive this understanding zealously seeks it through prayerful meditation on the Word of God.
We are instructed to pray, praise, rejoice and give thanks continually. If we desire to enter more deeply into the Word of God. We ask God who is within us for forgiveness, obedience, revelation and understanding of His Word. To yield in spirit to the Word of God that has touched us. The power to yield is not from ourselves. It comes from Jesus Christ the Word God.
When we understand, we reach out by faith to touch Jesus, the Word of God. Then His power reaches out to touch us. We feel His power, peace, presence and healing through the Holy Spirit. When we touch the Word of God by faith, the Word of God touches us in power. This meeting is one of silence, prayer, intimacy and power.
We aspire as a Church to make our community, neighbours and friends attentive to wisdom by inclining to soften their hearts through Understanding the saving grace of the Word of God our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.
Who Is Medhane Alem
- Medhane Alem our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ is the Son of God.
- Although Medhane Alem our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ was fully man; He was also fully God. He never once committed a sin during His life on earth. He is the only sinless man to ever live.
- Medhane Alem our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ lived a humble life. He was born in a stable. He was raised in the small and unassuming village of Nazareth where he was trained to be a simple carpenter.
- When Medhane Alem our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ began His earthly ministry, He selected an ordinary group of fishermen and ordinary citizens to be His followers.
- Medhane Alem our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ walked this earth just like the rest of us. He was one of us.
- Medhane Alem our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ lived among us so
- we could see God with our eyes,
- touch God with our hands,
- talk to God with our lips,
- hear God speak with our ears,
- live with God in our world.
- Medhane Alem our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ did all of this so we could learn how to be like Him, the Son of God.
- We can become children of God, too. Medhane Alem our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ has shown us how to live, love, laugh and be accepted in the eyes of God, who was His Father and is our Father.
- Medhane Alem our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ came to earth more than 2,000 years ago to save us from our sins, which separate us from God.
- Medhane Alem our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ alone had the power and ability to bring us back to God.
- By dying on the cross, Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ paid the price for our sins and made a way for us to live with God forever.
- Medhane Alem our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ was the substitute and voluntarily died in our place because we’re sinful people.
- We believe in Medhane Alem our Lord and Saviour’s promise of eternal life because He rose from the dead and still lives today.
Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church
The Ethiopian Church recognize that the inward essential authority of the Church is Jesus Christ Himself, who exercises it through the Holy Spirit, the Power of God that dwells within the Church.
The institutional authority in the hierarchy is believed to express the activity of Jesus Christ as an institutional organ. The hierarchy is responsible for the organized life of the Church. The hierarchy is not regarded as a separate class but as a constituent part of the people of God.
All ministry in the Church is the ministry of Jesus Christ to the Church and through the Church to the world. Because of this, the hierarchy does not function separately, but in close union with the laity in the Church’s teachings, worship and government.
The laity are given vital roles to play in the life of the Church in many spheres. Within, the wider ministry of the Church, the hierarchy is set apart by further unity. The Sacraments as a means of grace are conveyed to the faithful by the hierarchy’s ministry of grace. In so doing, the Church of Ethiopia teaches her children.
The Prayer Of Faith/Creed
We believe in One God, the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth and all things visible and invisible
And we believe in One Lord Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of the Father who was with Him before the creation of the world.
Light from Light, True God from True God, begotten not made of one essence with the Father.
By whom all things were made, and without Him was not anything in heaven or earth made:
Who for us men and for our salvation came down from heaven was made man and was incarnate from the Holy Spirit and from the Holy Virgin Mary.
Became man, was crucified for our sakes in the days of Pontius Pilate, suffered, died, was buried and rose from the dead on the third day as was written in the Holy Scriptures:
Ascended in glory into heaven, sat at the right hand of His Father, and will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead: There is no end to His reign.
And we believe in the Holy Spirit, the life-giving God, who proceedeth from the Father; we worship and glorify Him with the Father and the Son who spoke by prophets.
And we believe in one Holy, Universal, Apostolic Church:
And we believe in one Baptism for the remission of sins, and wait for the resurrection from the dead and the life to come, world without end.
OUR MISSION
An English Parish of Love, Culture and Understanding
This ministry is dedicated to the glory of God the Father, God the Son, God the Holy Spirit, the Comforter. The Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church is orthodox in faith, doctrine teachings and in its traditions. It is under the leadership of His Holiness Abuna Mathias I and the Holy Synod of Ethiopia.
We are a parish church in nature, spreading the “Good news” of the Word of God as mentioned by our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ in St. Matthew 28:19-20 “Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit: teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world.”
Focusing on the love of God through spiritual growth in the Church where no one stands alone on their journey of faith towards the Kingdom of Haven
LOVE
Only you, O Love, prepare me for the true service of God. Christian love. What is Christian love? The dictionary to consult here is our own hearts, “God is love.” Christian love is the feeling begotten in our hearts towards God and towards our fellow-men by the penetration into our hearts of the sense of the love of God to us when He gave His Only-begotten Son to die for us. Thus, God who is Love enters into union with man through the Son of His love and by the Spirit of love. Herein is love, not that we loved God, but that He loved us, and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins … we love, because He first loved us. To live in this divine love is the spiritual life. That is at once the natural and the supernatural history of Christian love. The mission the Church is to share Christian love with our members, community, neighbours and friends through nurturing support as we aspire to bring healing to the world through God’s Son the Saviour of the World Jesus Christ.
We are a parish church in nature, spreading the “Good news” of the Word of God as mentioned by our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ in St. Matthew 28:19-20 “Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Spirit: teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you always, even unto the end of the world.”
Focusing on the love of God through spiritual growth in the Church where no one stands alone on their journey of faith towards the Kingdom of Haven
CULTURE
To communicate the spiritual riches of ancient African Christianity as found within the living and cultural traditions of the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church; over two thousand plus years of faith and worship to the One True God. We from the Western Diaspora who have embraced this ancient culture of African Christianity finds its rich and inspiring traditions of worship has helped us to navigate our way through society’s cultural indifference to us as a people and infused in us a true worshipping spirit through the living cultural embrace of this ancient African faith. After realizing what it is like to worship the One True God though the living and spiritual riches of the culture within the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church, we want to share that vital richness of African Christianity through knowledge with our members, neighbours, community to elevate ourselves through the culture and spiritual riches of African Christianity.
UNDERSTANDING
Proverbs 3: 13-14 “Blessed is the one who finds wisdom, and the one who gets understanding, for the gain from her is better than gain from silver and her profit better than gold.”
Understanding is a gift from God to convert with soft hearts the Word of God and our willingness to obey. He who receive this understanding zealously seeks it through prayerful meditation on the Word of God.
We are instructed to pray, praise, rejoice and give thanks continually. If we desire to enter more deeply into the Word of God. We ask God who is within us for forgiveness, obedience, revelation and understanding of His Word. To yield in spirit to the Word of God that has touched us. The power to yield is not from ourselves. It comes from Jesus Christ the Word God.
When we understand, we reach out by faith to touch Jesus, the Word of God. Then His power reaches out to touch us. We feel His power, peace, presence and healing through the Holy Spirit. When we touch the Word of God by faith, the Word of God touches us in power. This meeting is one of silence, prayer, intimacy and power.
We aspire as a Church to make our community, neighbours and friends attentive to wisdom by inclining to soften their hearts through Understanding the saving grace of the Word of God our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ.
WHO IS MEDHANE ALEM
- Medhane Alem our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ is the Son of God.
- Although Medhane Alem our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ was fully man; He was also fully God. He never once committed a sin during His life on earth. He is the only sinless man to ever live.
- Medhane Alem our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ lived a humble life. He was born in a stable. He was raised in the small and unassuming village of Nazareth where he was trained to be a simple carpenter.
- When Medhane Alem our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ began His earthly ministry, He selected an ordinary group of fishermen and ordinary citizens to be His followers.
- Medhane Alem our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ walked this earth just like the rest of us. He was one of us.
- Medhane Alem our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ lived among us so
- we could see God with our eyes,
- touch God with our hands,
- talk to God with our lips,
- hear God speak with our ears,
- live with God in our world.
- Medhane Alem our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ did all of this so we could learn how to be like Him, the Son of God.
- We can become children of God, too. Medhane Alem our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ has shown us how to live, love, laugh and be accepted in the eyes of God, who was His Father and is our Father.
- Medhane Alem our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ came to earth more than 2,000 years ago to save us from our sins, which separate us from God.
- Medhane Alem our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ alone had the power and ability to bring us back to God.
- By dying on the cross, Our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ paid the price for our sins and made a way for us to live with God forever.
- Medhane Alem our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ was the substitute and voluntarily died in our place because we’re sinful people.
- We believe in Medhane Alem our Lord and Saviour’s promise of eternal life because He rose from the dead and still lives today.
ETHIOPIAN ORTHODOX TEWAHEDO CHURCH
The Ethiopian Church recognize that the inward essential authority of the Church is Jesus Christ Himself, who exercises it through the Holy Spirit, the Power of God that dwells within the Church.
The institutional authority in the hierarchy is believed to express the activity of Jesus Christ as an institutional organ. The hierarchy is responsible for the organized life of the Church. The hierarchy is not regarded as a separate class but as a constituent part of the people of God.
All ministry in the Church is the ministry of Jesus Christ to the Church and through the Church to the world. Because of this, the hierarchy does not function separately, but in close union with the laity in the Church’s teachings, worship and government.
The laity are given vital roles to play in the life of the Church in many spheres. Within, the wider ministry of the Church, the hierarchy is set apart by further unity. The Sacraments as a means of grace are conveyed to the faithful by the hierarchy’s ministry of grace. In so doing, the Church of Ethiopia teaches her children.
THE PRAYER OF FAITH/CREED
We believe in One God, the Father Almighty, maker of heaven and earth and all things visible and invisible
And we believe in One Lord Jesus Christ, the only begotten Son of the Father who was with Him before the creation of the world.
Light from Light, True God from True God, begotten not made of one essence with the Father.
By whom all things were made, and without Him was not anything in heaven or earth made:
Who for us men and for our salvation came down from heaven was made man and was incarnate from the Holy Spirit and from the Holy Virgin Mary.
Became man, was crucified for our sakes in the days of Pontius Pilate, suffered, died, was buried and rose from the dead on the third day as was written in the Holy Scriptures:
Ascended in glory into heaven, sat at the right hand of His Father, and will come again in glory to judge the living and the dead: There is no end to His reign.
And we believe in the Holy Spirit, the life-giving God, who proceedeth from the Father; we worship and glorify Him with the Father and the Son who spoke by prophets.
And we believe in one Holy, Universal, Apostolic Church:
And we believe in one Baptism for the remission of sins, and wait for the resurrection from the dead and the life to come, world without end.
Our Partners
