Last month, Egypt’s Coptic Orthodox Church held its first-ever Christmas Eve Mass in Saudi Arabia for Coptic Egyptians residing there. Coptic Christians and the Coptic media in Egypt cheered the event as a milestone for those who live in the Persian Gulf and lauded the government of Saudi Arabia for actively heading toward the “horizons of the developed world.”
Last week, Coptic Christians in Egypt celebrated the memory of the Holy Family’s Flight into Egypt, when Mary, Child Jesus, and Joseph fled to Egypt to take refuge from the persecution of King Herod, during which they visited more than two dozen places, from Arish through the Delta and Cairo, to Assiut in Upper Egypt.
Egyptian Cardinal Antonios Naguib, retired patriarch of the Coptic Catholic Church, died March 28 at the age of 87.
Coptic Christians in Egypt are desperately waiting for action to be taken on a new law governing the legal status of their worship, which was drafted by leaders of the other main churches in Egypt and the Ministry of Justice several months ago.
Last January, the Egyptian embassy in Washington D.C. published a document titled “Strengthening National Unity: Religious Freedom and Diversity in Egypt” that claimed great progress in the treatment of Egypt’s Coptic Christians.
After more than four years waiting for justice, an elderly Coptic Christian woman, who was attacked and dragged naked down the street by a Muslim mob in her village in Egypt, feels shock and injustice as the court ruling acquitted the assailants. The acquittal by the Minya Governorate criminal court of three defendants — of a father and his two sons — in December has provoked outrage among Coptic Christians and rights groups.
Several families of Coptic Catholics from Egypt have settled in Staten Island where they continue their pursuit of the Focolare movement, sharing the Gospel in Arabic and English, urging unity, and welcoming all.
