Ethiopians Fear for Their Interfaith Oasis

In Dese, it is easy to find someone like Zinet Hassen, a Muslim woman wearing a long, black burqa who said, nonchalantly: "My uncle converted to Christianity but there was no stigma."

It is a kind of coexistence that has endured despite the fact that Orthodox Christians have historically had the upper hand in Ethiopia, politically and economically. In the 1880s, for instance, Muslims in Dese were forced to convert to Christianity, an edict the emperor issued as a means of consolidating power.

Under the socialist Dergue government of the 1970s and '80s, religious expression was discouraged, and it became difficult to acquire land to build churches and mosques. The situation changed dramatically when Meles took power in 1991 and lifted those sorts of restrictions.

Since then, mosques have been springing up across the country, many funded by Saudi or Yemeni financiers, along with a kind of competition with the Orthodox church, and to some extent, evangelical Christian churches, which receive funding from U.S. religious groups.

In Dese, four new mosques have been built in recent years, and more are under construction. Orthodox Christians have kept pace with five new churches since 1993. "We have plans to do more," the archbishop said. "We've now applied to build six more churches in Dese in every direction."

Since the Sept. 11 attacks, the competition has been heightened as a strain of more fundamentalist Islam has woven through Ethiopian society and, in Dese, taken hold in some mosques. One mosque in the city now barricades the area at prayer time. Some young men have begun growing their beards long, and more young women are wearing burqas, sights that were once rare.

Imam Omar Adam, for instance, complained that a man was ridiculed by some Muslims for worshiping trees, which is forbidden by Islam.

Even some idirs have separated along religious lines. And here and there, friendships have fallen apart.

Helen Alebachew, a Christian, said she and a Muslim woman grew up playing at each other's houses but hardly even look at each other anymore.

"Out of the blue, suddenly she joins this group of extremists," said Alebachew, 19, using a label Christians here often apply to more devout Muslims. "Even in school she stopped saying hi."

Given these tensions, some Muslim leaders in Dese say they have been accused of encouraging radicalism, a claim they tend to dismiss as Christian propaganda.

"Me, I'm not fundamentalist," said Ahmed Mousa, who runs the 80-year-old Showber Islamic school in Dese, where children are still taught with the help of whips. "I'm Ethiopian."