ADDIS ABABA: Ethiopia's Christian community is in mourning after the head of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church Abune Paulos died on Thursday at the age of 76-years-old. “He was a great leader and a man we should all look up to,” a Christian man attending a remembrance service in the capital, Addis Ababa, told Bikyamasr.com on Saturday morning. The foreign ministry said he had been receiving treatment over the past week for an undisclosed illness. The patriarch's office was due to hold an emergency meeting on Friday to finalize arrangements for what most are expecting to be a state funeral. Abune Paulos led Ethiopia's 40 million Orthodox Christians – half the population – since 1992. Mulugeta Aserate Kassa, an adviser at the Ethiopian Embassy in London, told the BBC's Focus on Africa program the patriarch had been “very healthy” on Wednesday, when he led a service in the Ethiopian capital, Addis Ababa. But he died on Thursday and Christians in the country are waiting for news of the cause of death. “Either way, he was a man we can all look for in our lives and as Ethiopia moves forward, as someone to follow,” another worshiper said.