Tag: Cairo

Cairo bishop urges Church to be ready for martyrdom

October 14, 2016 Egypt Berbers, Cairo, Copts, North Africa, Refugees, Tunisia

Archbishop Mouneer Anis. Michael Adel, Bridges Cultural Center A senior Anglican archbishop from the Global South called for the Church to be “ready to sacrifice their lives for the sake of Christ” in the face of persecution, restrictions, terrorism, and violence carried out in the name of religion. Archbishop . . . Read More

Coptic priests in Gulf meet to discuss challenges

August 13, 2016 Alexandria, Arabian Peninsula, Bahrain, Cairo, Copts, Egypt, Islamic extremism, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, United Arab Emirates

Egyptian priests serving in the Arab Gulf region have held their first conference to discuss challenges faced in the heartland of Islam: “Challenges facing Gulf priests and their wives”. The head of the largest group of Christians in the Middle East, Coptic Orthodox Pope Tawadros II led bishops and priests . . . Read More

Al-Azhar: to leave Islam is ‘treason’

June 22, 2016 Al-Azhar, Apostasy, Cairo, Converts, Egypt, Islamic extremism, Mohammed Hegazy, Ramadan, Sharia, Sunni

To convert away from Islam is “treason” that should carry the death penalty, according to Sunni Islam’s topmost religious authority. “The penalty for an open apostate, departing from the community, is well stipulated in Sharia,” Al-Azhar’s Grand Imam Ahmed el-Tayyib declared on Egypt television last week. “An apostate must be . . . Read More

Egypt returns confiscated SAT-7 equipment

February 5, 2016 Egypt Cairo, Censorship, Egypt

Egyptian authorities have returned all the equipment they had earlier confiscated from SAT-7 local offices, (Feb.2). This comes more than three months after the country’s censorship police , seizing computers and production equipment. On October 10, 2015, the authorities came to the SAT-7 Cairo offices with a search warrant. Country . . . Read More

Egypt’s imams and priests confront sectarianism together

December 29, 2015 Egypt Al-Azhar, Cairo, Hosni Mubarak, Ismailia, Luxor, Mohamed Morsi, Port Said, Sohag

For three years, the Imam-Priest Exchange has brought Christian and Muslim leaders together to deepen religious unity.World Watch Monitor Gathered at Cairo’s prestigious Dar al-Mudarra’at military complex in early December, 150 imams and priests heard some of Egypt’s highest religious authorities praise their participation in a three-year programme to . . . Read More

Al-Azhar bans book on blasphemy in Egypt

September 28, 2015 Egypt Al-Azhar, Blasphemy, Cairo, Egypt, Islamic extremism

Egypt’s top Islamic authority visited a well-known bookshop in central Cairo last week, telling it to halt sales of the book “Blasphemy in Egypt” by two prominent Egyptian authors. “Officials representing Al-Azhar and the Egyptian Ministry of Islamic Endowments visited Madbouli Bookshop and asked them to stop selling the book . . . Read More

Egypt allocates land for new Cairo churches

January 29, 2015 Egypt Cairo, Churches, Copts, Egypt

Agenzia Fides reports a plot of land, the size of 2.5 acres (30 hectares), has been made available to the Coptic Patriarchate to build offices connected to the Cathedral of San Marco in Cairo. Three additional smaller plots will be allocated in other areas across the capital for the construction of . . . Read More

Egyptian fire crew in no hurry to put out church fire

September 9, 2014 Egypt Cairo, Copts, Egypt

The pounding on the door shook Mina Hanna awake. A neighbour had urgent news: Fire at the church. It was 3 a.m. on Aug. 20. Hanna and his younger brother, Ibrahim Saber, ran to their church, Mar Girgis Coptic Orthodox, in the Sharara village in the centre of Abu Qurqas, . . . Read More

Egypt’s President visits church

January 6, 2014 Egypt Cairo, Christmas, Copts, Egypt, Islamic extremism

Egypt’s President has attended Christmas celebrations at Cairo’s Orthodox Cathedral: reported to be the first time in history that the President has done so. The gesture of solidarity comes at a poignant time for Egypt’s 10% Christian minority, who last year experienced their worst violence, at the hands of lslamists, . . . Read More

Shot Copt dies on New Year’s Eve after hospital ‘negligence’

January 4, 2014 Egypt Cairo, Copts, Maspero, Muslim Brotherhood

A Coptic Christian man died on New Year’s Eve from a gunshot wound to the head after three hospitals in Cairo are reported to have turned him away. Ihab Ghattas, 23, was shot outside Mar Girgis (St George’s) Church in the Ain Shams area of Cairo after celebrating mass. The . . . Read More

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