He is a man of bulk, but he walks quietly, almost glides; his flowing robes, tufted raincloud beard and gold cross clutched in his fist dramatically portray his eminence, but he keeps a low profile, his life has been full of contention, but he speaks softly. Archbishop Abuna Yesehaq is the head of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church in the Western Hemisphere, emissary and shuttle diplomacist of Emperor Haile Selassie to the new world, godfather and spiritual advisor of Bob and Rita Marley and their children. His accomplishments are impressive, yet mysteriously unheralded. Inheralded perhaps because the Archbishop is the kingpin in a deep schism running through the Rastafarian community which many would probably prefer to keep hushed. The archbishop is a comfortable, affable, generous man, and fatherly in the way priests are painted in the movies. I have seen him in three of his guises: as a prelate serving mass, as a mover and shaker amongst peoples of the Diaspora in New York City, and at home with his church "family". In each aspect one senses a quiet awe and obeisance of those around him, paternal concern, and familiarity on his part and the underlying thrill of history drawing you to him. Laike Mandefro was born in Addis Ababa in 1933. He attended first lay then liturgical schools in Ethiopia and was ordained a deacon and priest there. The young prelate was among several taken under Emperor's Haile Selassie's wing. As the Archbishop relates it, "His Majesty was tutoring us as his own children." Laike Mandfredo was invested as Abuna Yesehaq (the Old Testament's "Isaac"), Archbishop of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church in the Western Hemisphere, in 1979. Selassie made a momentous trip to Jamaica in 1966, where for the first time he saw people -Rastafarians- worshipping him as God. The emperor was reportedly deeply dismayed. At a Kingston news conference he attempted to dispel the belief in his divinity with his response to a pointed question from Jamaican Minister of Education, Edward Allen. "I am a man, and man cannot worship man" are perhaps the most oft-quoted word the Emperor has ever said. Despite the famous disavowal, the Archbishop relates that many continued to maintain, "He is our God, even if he doesn't say he's God." In 1970, still distressed, the Emperor announced to the priest: "There is a problem in Jamaica.... Please, help these people. They are misunderstanding, they do not understand our culture.... They need a church to be established and you are chosen to go." He arrived in Jamaica shortly thereafter and began building the first Ethiopian Orthodox Church in Kingston. Later, "Rasta churches" would dot the island, in fact, the whole English-speaking Caribbean, and various locations in North America, including New York and Toronto. While the prelate was busy in Kingston founding a house of worship and gathering a flock, he had another, perhaps more difficult task to accomplish - that of mediating between the authorities and the Rastafarian community as a whole. Wholesale persecutions were being carried out against Rasta. Be found on the streets with lock by a cop with an attitude or something to prove, and you ran the risk of being arrested, roughed up, even shot. Some call those roundups attempted genocide. The Archbishop agrees they were terrible times and says he spent endless hours ate the station house securing Rastas' release. "They (the police) used to beat them and kill them. Just for nothing." he recollects. "All that pain is eased now," he observes. "After that, they have good relations with the police." I had to correct him, "Better relations with the police." "Yes, better. Thank you." The major condition for baptism is to renounce the divinity of Haile Selassie. "That is number one," says the Archbishop. "It is the major thing." And it remains the primary point of departure separating the "Rasta Christians" from all other branches of Rastafari. Another philosophical chasm is the categorical unacceptability, on the part of many outside the Church, of embracing any form of Christianity, a Babylon religion, one that preaches the same tenets as the "hypocrites" who brought Africans here as slaves -even if that christianity, the oldest in the world, were founded by Africans with strong, Africanist teachings.