ABUNA. - In Arabic "our father"; thus the Christians of the Arab countries call the priest. In Ethiopia it is the title of the head of the dissident Church.

A. is also the surname of Simeone IV, who was patriarch of the Nestorians (1437-77), and in 1450 made the patriarchate a hereditary right. In 1776, Elijah X A. (1722-78) consecrated as bishop his nephew John Hormez at the age of 16 so that he might succeed him instead of his other nephew Jesu-Yab. Hormez, however, having converted to Catholicism immediately after the death of Elijah X, did not succeed him, and only in 1830 was he preconized patriarch of the Catholic Chaldeans. With him, in 1838, the series of patriarchs of the A. family, which had become Catholic, comes to an end.

Bibliography2 works

BIBL.: J. Zfinkdji, L'Église chaldéenne catholique (estratto dall'Annuaire pontifical catholique di Battandier), Paris 1914, pp. 13-15; St. Bello, La Congrégation de S. Hormisdas et l'Église chaldéenne dans la première moitié du XIXe siècle, in Orient. Christ. Analecta, CXXII, Rome 1939.

Pietro Sfair

@incollection{ec1_abuna, author = {Sfair, Pietro}, title = {Abuna}, booktitle = {Enciclopedia Cattolica}, volume = {I}, pages = {154}, note = {Cited by column}, publisher = {Ente per l’Enciclopedia Cattolica e per il Libro Cattolico}, address = {Città del Vaticano}, year = {1948}, url = {https://azioneromana.com/article/abuna} }

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