In Memoriam 1992-1997/Asmerom Fekadu

In Memoriam 1992-1997 Asmerom Fekadu

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ASMEROM FEKADU

1938–1996

DEEPLY GRIEVED SUDDEN PASSING DISTINGUISHED STAUNCH PROMOTER CAUSE ASMEROM FEKADU. HIS INDEFATIGABLE DEVOTED SERVICES UNFORGETTABLE. ASSURE RELATIVES FERVENT PRAYERS PROGRESS HIS RADIANT SOUL WORLDS GOD.

Universal House of Justice August 28, 1996

Asmerom Fekadu was born in 1938 in Asmara, Eritrea, of Corporal Fekadu Reda and Mrs. Hiwot Gebratatiyos. He completed his elementary and secondary education at the Comboni (Catholic) School in Asmara. He interrupted his education to become a schoolteacher for a year and later enrolled at the Gondar College of Medicine and Health Sciences, graduating as a health officer.

During his days at Gondar College, he was fortunate to come under the wings of Dr. Abbas Afnán and his wife Shomais. He was nurtured by their love—a love that enabled him to achieve higher levels of spirituality. He loved the Afnáns and considered them as parents. He was one of the five Bahá’í youth who embraced the Faith during the first Bahá’í school in Eritrea in 1957.

Dr. Asmerom married Beletu Alemayehu, and they were blessed with two children, a daughter, Firchiwot, and a son, Henock. He continued his education and earned his MD at the University of Addis Ababa. He then pursued a specialization in tropical diseases in Liverpool, England, and industrial medicine in San Francisco in the United States. He became an assistant professor and a medical director and eventually assumed the position of

202 See Abbas Afnán, pp. 304–6.

[Page 347]...industrial safety advisor in the Office of the Prime Minister of Eritrea.

Dr. Asmerom put the Faith first throughout his life in such a way that his great love for it infected those around him; he inspired others to believe that they too could accomplish worthy deeds for the Cause. It was not so much that his deeds were extraordinary, but the motives he brought to the tasks he undertook and the quality of character he displayed were truly outstanding and exemplary. It was his great love that led him to arise, even before the end of the Ethiopian Civil War, to reestablish the Bahá’í community of Nazareth (Adama). His detachment enabled him to arise to travel teach during those dark and restricted days. He inspired others to homefront pioneer and personally deputized believers to travel teach to areas he could not reach.

The systematic approaches to teaching and deepening that he developed while in Asmara, and especially in Masawa, bore fruit at the end of the civil war (1974–91) when they were applied to the reestablishment of the communities of Nazareth and Modjo.

Dr. Asmerom was also systematic in his own deepening, being particularly interested in biblical prophecies concerning the advent of Bahá’u’lláh and the Writings of Bahá’u’lláh related to the reality of man. He approached these studies in a very careful and scholarly way and spoke eloquently on these topics and mesmerized his audiences.

He was a member of the National Spiritual Assembly and at the time of his death had been working on an assignment of the Assembly a draft proposal of a Four Year Plan.

He was shocked to learn of Dr. Abbas Afnán’s passing, and he died suddenly and peacefully about a hundred days later on August 24, 1996. Two nights before his passing he had given an enlightening talk to the youth at the Hazíratu’l-Quds in which he had told them, “Teach the Faith and don’t you be afraid at all.”

Dr. Asmerom is remembered with love, respect, and admiration by the Bahá’í community and by the public. He was a true Bahá’í doctor. His medical intuition was remarkable, and his patients, mostly the poor from the rural areas, came from miles around and waited as long as necessary to be treated by him. They trusted him because he was exceptionally kind and because he showered them with tender and loving care.

From a memoir submitted by The National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of Ethiopia