How did the Coptic Church come into existence?
Christianity was first preached in Abyssinia by St. Frumentius who had been consecrated Bishop by St. Athanasius in 341 A.D. He preached the faith of the Roman Church to which all the Christian world adhered insofar as it was the faith St. Peter himself had preached at Rome. Over 100 years after the consecration of St. Frumentius, Eutyches, an Archimandrite of Constantinople, was condemned as a heretic at the Council of Chalcedon in 451. Refusing to submit, Eutyches commenced the Monophysite heresy. Now some Bishops from the Abyssinian Church founded by St. Frumentius 110 years earlier were present at the Council of Chalcedon. They then acknowledged the jurisdiction of Pope Leo I. But they became infected by the Monophysite heresy, went back to their own country, broke away from the authority of Rome, and commenced that sect which today is called the Coptic Church of Abyssinia. The word “Coptic” means “Egyptian,” and the “Copts” are simply the descendants of the Monophysite heretics in
