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Egypt: Christians pelted with rocks, four churches closed as government treats prayer “as a crime”

Nov 1, 2017 9:48 am By Christine Douglass-Williams

According to the Coptic Orthodox Archbishop of Minya, in describing the worsening state of persecution against the Copts in Egypt:

What happened within two weeks, hasn’t happen over years; churches are closed, the Coptic Christians are being attacked and their property destroyed, and there is no deterrent

The walls have been closing in for the historic Coptic Church in Egypt, yet virtually nothing is being done.

they have been pelted by rocks while the government in the southern province of Minya has closed down four churches this past month

Coptic Christians have been fleeing Egypt by the tens of thousands since Muslim Brotherhood leader Mohammed Morsi took over in 2012. After Morsi was toppled by a military coup in 2013, the Muslim Brotherhood blamed the nation’s Christians, and attacks upon them intensified.

Last April, Egyptian President Abdel Fatah al-Sisi declared a state of emergency after an Islamic State attack on two Coptic churches killed at least 43 people.

One needs to wonder what is going on with Sisi, with all his talk against “radical Islam” and his outward verbal support for the Coptic Church. According to the International Business Times:

Christians continue to complain of rampant and systemic discrimination, and they are virtually shut out from the political sphere. All church construction and repairs must be approved by authorities, and Christians in rural areas have frequently been on the receiving end of violent attacks. Human rights groups say crimes against Christians regularly go unpunished.

“Coptic Christians Pelted With Rocks, Four Churches Closed as Government Treats Prayer ‘as a Crime’”, by Stoyan Zaimov, Christian Post, October 31, 2017:

Coptic Christians in Egypt have said that they have been pelted by rocks while the government in the southern province of Minya has closed down four churches this past month, much to the protest of the believers.

“We stayed silent for two weeks after the closure of a church hoping that the officials would do the job they were assigned to do by the state. However, this silence has led to something worse, as if prayer is a crime the Copts should be punished for. The Coptic Christians go to the neighboring villages to perform their prayers,” the Coptic Orthodox Archbishop of Minya said in a statement, as reported on Sunday.

“What happened within two weeks, hasn’t happen over years; churches are closed, the Coptic Christians are being attacked and their property destroyed, and there is no deterrent. The bargaining and the balance are usually used under the name of peaceful coexistence. The Copts always pay the price of this coexistence, not the aggressors,” the statement continued.

It further called the reaction from Egyptian authorities “disappointing,” and argued that whenever there is an attack on Copts, aggressors are treated with impunity.

Coptic Christians have complained that they have been harassed and pelted with rocks at churches, Reuters noted.

The Minya security directorate has not yet commented on the statement from the Minya diocese. The government has vowed to protect Christians from violent Islamic attacks on a number of occasions, though Christians have complained that not enough is being done to secure their safety.

A number of families who have been forced to flee North Sinai said in a statement in May that they are “suffering” due to neglect.

“We are the families displaced from al-Arish to Port Said in February. We are living inside small rooms inside the youth camps and the aid building. We are suffering and none of the officials or the Port Said governor will listen to us,” the statement read at the time.

“As time passed, 28 families remained in the camps and aid buildings. Three months passed without any attention from the government or officials in Port Said. The governor then declared that there was a lack of residential houses to transfer the families to, in addition to a lack to jobs, which forced the martyr Nabil Saber to return to Arish, where he was killed — a message to every Copt thinking about returning.”

The statement came following a deadly attack by IS gunmen on a group of Copts traveling to a monastery in Minya, which left 29 believers dead and 24 others wounded.

Bishop Anba Angaelos of the Coptic Orthodox Church in the U.K. also recently condemned the killing of priests in Egypt, such as the fate of Samaan Shehta, who was murdered in Cairo by a suspected IS radical……

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Filed Under: Coptic Christians, Egypt Tagged With: Minya


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Comments

  1. mortimer says

    Nov 1, 2017 at 10:06 am

    IT’S THE IDEOLOGY, STUPID!

    K.9:29 Fight those who do not believe in God and the last day… and fight People of the Book, who do not accept the religion of truth (Islam) until they pay tribute by hand, being inferior

    K.66:9 Strive against the disbelievers and the hypocrites, and be stern with them. Hell will be their home, a hapless journey’s end.

    K.9:28 O you who believe! Verily, the Mushrikûn (wrong worshippers) are Najasun (impure). So let them not come near the Forbidden Mosque.

    K.47:4 When you meet the unbelievers, strike off their heads; then when you have made wide slaughter among them, carefully tie up the remaining captives.

    K.3:28 Let not the believers take for friends or helpers disbelievers rather than believers: if any do that, in nothing will there be help from Allah.

  2. mortimer says

    Nov 1, 2017 at 10:13 am

    The persecution of the Copts is systemic to Islam. Christians going about their daily business make easy targets for jihadists who have read and believed Islam’s source texts.

    On the other hand, it is truly unbelievable and depressing that after 14 centuries of Islamic invasion that more Copts do not understand Islam and it is truly shocking that so few Copts have MASTERED Islamic doctrines such as taqiyya, jihad, dualism, the kafir doctrine, Al Walaa wal Baraa, and Islamic misogyny. Eastern Christians should be well informed, we would expect, but they are appallingly uninformed about Islamic doctrines, relying on personal observations and anecdotes, rather than on a personal, in-depth study of the source texts. Eastern Christians SHOULD be teaching the rest of the world, but there are few of them sadly like Robert Spencer or Fr. Zakariah Botros or Fr.Henri Boulad, SJ of Alexandria.

    • St. Manuel II Palaiologos says

      Nov 1, 2017 at 2:31 pm

      The Copts I know are very aware of Islamic doctrines. Where are you getting this idea that Eastern Christians are ignorant about Islam?

      Also, we’re not really “Eastern” anymore, just FYI. In terms of our liturgical and dogmatic development, but not in terms of our geography.

      • Flavius Claudius Iulianus says

        Nov 2, 2017 at 6:30 am

        The Copts are more precious to us than many realize. With the Ethiopians they are one of the oldest rites of Christianity. And the Copts hold the true claim to being the original Egyptians (and not the Mohammadin invaders). So old is this culture that the Copts still sing the ancient Pharonic songs and their rituals hark back far beyond Saint Mark’s conversion of the Egyptians. They are a living preservation of a four thousand year old culture and must be protected at all costs.

        • John Forbes says

          Nov 3, 2017 at 10:23 pm

          THE CURRENT ISLAMIC POPE SIMPLY DOES NOT CARE & WILL NOT LISTEN !
          THOSE IN THE VATICAN ARE AFRAID & ARE APPEASERS & SEEM TO HAVE BOWED DOWN TO ISLAM ALREADY !

          KICK THIS POPE OUT & FAST !!!

    • gravenimage says

      Nov 1, 2017 at 9:08 pm

      Under Shari’ah, Infidels are not allowed to read the Qur’an or learn about Islam in any kind of organized way. Most of what they can learn about Islam comes directly from their being persecuted by Muslims.

  3. Benedict says

    Nov 1, 2017 at 11:04 am

    – prayer “as a crime” –
    I agree! Muslim prayer is a crime against humanity.

    • Michael says

      Nov 1, 2017 at 3:06 pm

      What is a crime against humanity is religious apartheid and genocide, which Islam commands of its followers, as are idolatry and blasphemy.

  4. JanwoG says

    Nov 1, 2017 at 11:30 am

    This within the context of decadent main stream churches flirting with Islam and despising persecuted Christians. These churches are a shame of Christianity in the move of massive apostasy.

    • St. Manuel II Palaiologos says

      Nov 1, 2017 at 2:33 pm

      Most of them don’t fit the definition of Churches in the first place, so I find your outrage basically superfluous.

  5. LeftisruiningCanada says

    Nov 1, 2017 at 7:29 pm

    Kyrie, eleison

  6. Matthieu Baudin says

    Nov 1, 2017 at 8:38 pm

    It seems most likely that Sisi’s grip on power is tenuous and has been so for years. It’s difficult to imagine that he’s been duplicitous in his public statements re the Copts since he’s put himself firmly in the cross hairs by his comments and the toppling of the Muslim Brotherhood. How fanaticised is the Muslim Egyptian population? Who knows? But they may be following in the footsteps of Algerian society after the Soviet military collapse in Afghanistan.

    • gravenimage says

      Nov 1, 2017 at 9:35 pm

      I doubt that Al-Sisi was ever the champion of Christians many hoped for–he just wasn’t going to *directly* target them to the extent that the Muslim Brotherhood would have.

  7. gravenimage says

    Nov 1, 2017 at 9:03 pm

    Egypt: Christians pelted with rocks, four churches closed as government treats prayer “as a crime”
    ……………………

    Things are getting worse for the Copts in Egypt–so much for the idea that Egypt was going to be a paradise for Christians under Al-Sisi…

  8. Flavius Claudius Iulianus says

    Nov 2, 2017 at 6:17 am

    https://www.rt.com/news/408522-egypt-ripped-jeans-rape/

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