POTENTIALS, CHALLENGES AND OPPORTUNITIES FOR RELIGIOUS TOURISM DEVELOPMENT: THE CASE OF QOMA FASILEDES CHURCH, ETHIOPIA

Abstract

Religious tourism is type of tourism, expressing tourists' desire to engage for religious reasons and travel from their usual environment to another sacred place. Therefore, this study was intended to identify potentials, challenges and opportunities for religious tourism development at Qoma Fasiledes church. To this end, a qualitative research approach and a cross-sectional descriptive study design was employed. The target populations were Zone and Woreda’s culture and tourism office experts, Qoma Fasiledes Betekihinet leaders and church scholars in Qoma Fasiledes church. 13 respondents were selected by non-probable sampling technique, using purposive sampling. Both primary and secondary data sources were employed. Hence, primary data were collected from interviews, focus group discussions and field observation. Whereas, secondary sources from published and unpublished documents. Findings indicate that; the long history of Qoma Fasiledes church, religious festivals, school education, Qomie Zema, mural painting, the Church building itself, treasure house and many movable heritages made from gold and silver including crosses, crowns and yisma Qoma Negarit were potentials for religious tourism development. Challenges were lack of infrastructure, lack of promotion, lack of professionals, absence of museum and lack of awareness. Even though the church has such challenges, still it has much more opportunities to develop religious tourism; government policy, availability of other religious sites nearby and growing up religious travelers. Therefore, to develop religious tourism in Qoma Fasiledes church all stakeholders should be collaborated together to use potentials and mitigate the hindering factors through examining the opportunities.