In the matter of atheism, the Minister of Awqaf says: Religion is the pillar of life since life without religion lacks values and morals. He added that religion is the backbone to control the course of mankind on the right path. Traditions and laws can t control the movement of man in the universe unless this man has a close connection to his Creator. Once a wise man said: It is difficult and even impossible to assign a policeman or a guard to each person in order to guard him and such guard may also need another guard to watch over him. Pope Tawadros believes that the main reason for atheism is the lack of dialogue in society and not spending enough time with the family. He added that atheism is the greatest danger facing our society even with a little number of atheists. Pope said that man wants to rebel against the authority of God, and there are philosophies that emerged 100 years ago and paved the way for atheism. Such rebel appeared even within ones life when people fail to accept oneself and has to escape to addiction or crime.

For a long time, through my writings, meetings and media interviews I have expressed my surprise and anger over the expression moderate Christianity by those who defend coexistence just like they demand moderate Islam. This shows that clergy are using form of politicization of religion and apply non-spiritual names and descriptions to their faiths. They try to show that each sect has its own moderate form that gives different models of religion! Thus, the fixed elements of religion should stay the same even when time changes. With the increasing frequency of waves of extremism all over the world, the misuse of verses leads to political plots by evil organizations. We should remember here the words of French President Francois Hollande at the Conference on Democracy in the Face of Terrorism and his assertion. He said that we all must fight against extremism and terrorism and seek creating (French Islam). The French have different religions and races, but received the same rights and duties. The French model is threatened, and the social model has to be fixed. This social model was not considered by president Sadat when he said he is a Muslim president of a Muslim country. He should rather declared he is an Egyptian president of all Egyptians.

"Our Lord loves beauty including Peace and goodness. In our country we offer beauty and goodness before the whole world” This was part of the speech given by President Abdul Fattah al-Sisi during his visit to the Great Cathedral of St. Mark to congratulate Copts on Christmas. The Coptic church has been trying to motivate its congregation to develop an active participation in all social, political and human activities. For instance, Bishop Moussa of Youth Bishopric gave examples to such active participation like voting in the elections, participating in the political parties, student unions and public syndicates, in addition to civil society associations.

"Our Lord loves beauty including Peace and goodness. In our country we offer beauty and goodness before the whole world” This was part of the speech given by President Abdul Fattah al-Sisi during his visit to the Great Cathedral of St. Mark to congratulate Copts on Christmas. The Coptic church has been trying to motivate its congregation to develop an active participation in all social, political and human activities. For instance, Bishop Moussa of Youth Bishopric gave examples to such active participation like voting in the elections, participating in the political parties, student unions and public syndicates, in addition to civil society associations.

As we fight terrorism at all levels, we have to pay attention to all our life practices at home, street, school, university and the club, and more importantly in the mosque and the church. We have to denounce intimidation and encourage enticement and reasonable speech. We may notice that our religious discourse is full of intimidation and exaggeration through its speech and even the way of delivering sermons. They are full of violence and shouting, especially when it comes to the other life and God s punishment to the bad people. This kind of speech has now its masters who pioneers.

As some new instructions are being issued by some bishops concerning dress code in churches and encouraging them to wear decent clothes, I would like to present this story in a short way, which was published in the photographer s magazine on August 26, 1927. The magazine reads: "A delegation of Italian women met with His Holiness Pope of the Vatican asking for his blessing and support in their fight against indecent fashion considering it corrupted taste.

There is no doubt that cultural dialogue and rooting for it is an important deal, especially as we are living in the era of construction where we learn and benefit from successful experiences in the world. This should show us how to maximize that benefit and reduce the losses. Communication with others is a necessity regardless of our individual desires, but we care more about effective communication since we fear new experiences.

On the occasion of our church s celebration of the half-century anniversary of the apparition of our lady on the domes of her church in Zeitoun. Some Coptic leaders made statements to provoke other dominations in an unacceptable absence of the spirit of love according to the teachings of the Bible. Therefore, I present this form of love proclaimed by a Japanese philosopher more than a century ago. He said: Unless love is rooted in the soul of human being, it cannot understand God s love…love knows all including sadness, laughter, tolerance, work, hunger, accepting danger, respect. It knows almost everything. Love accepts suffering and pain and can make wonders. Thus, it is able to do everything.

The homeland is not necessarily a land, water, sky, or human being with the similar skin color and the same language. It could be a doctrine or a religion or even goal or a dream. People may feel isolated by retardation or political regimes. This may lead a citizen to live marginalized and not belonging to his or her homeland. There is no doubt that the media, as much as they represent a measure of belonging in any society, it may affect it negatively or positively in supporting belonging and citizenship. I can see a number of positive attempts of media in that account, but the majority of examples are unfortunately negative.

Three years ago, there was a great advertising posted on more than 800 buses roaming the streets of London carrying the words God may not be there, stop worrying and enjoy your life The words of course belong to atheists who disbelieve the existence of God. It also carries a message that life away from God Almighty can be better and fun. Even though we refuse such message, 800 Christian associations moved followed by Islamic societies to demand the ban of these advertisements. The media watchdog has received 110 claims to stop it. The British Humanitarian Society, which contributed to the funding of the advertising campaign, said the watch dog has a big responsibility to rule whether or not God existed.

In the midst of several recent bombings in our Egyptian churches, I was happy as a Coptic Christian citizen to see the religious discourse of the Coptic church focusing on the beauty of life and its value after it used to focus on the other life. Abba Raphael, secretary of the Holy Synod, sent three messages in a sermon he delivered at one of these funerals. First, we believe in the heavenly justice, second, we love our country; third, we won t abandon our faith. The fathers of the Egyptian Church told us that martyrdom in the Arabic language means being killed for the sake of God. It simply means being summoned for witness on one s faith. Our martyrs sacrificed their souls as they declared their faith before extremist murderers.

Terrorism is like a virus that spreads everywhere, and there is constant injection of it by all evil forces that supports terrorism. No doubt that intellectual people and supporters of culture and enlightenment are at the forefront target of the extremists who claim they protect religion, but they spread myths among the simple people. I believe that our cultural and educational institutions have a great deal of work to consolidate illuminating human thought and to create better reality in Egypt supported by war waged by Egyptian army against terrorism. Therefore, we have to define sources of terrorism and extremism that are supported by ignorance what should be faced by culture and a plan of renewal of religious discourse.

In his wonderful book Kirialison in the love of the Copts , Hamdi Rizk wrote that his book is a gift for the Copts at the Christmas Day. He said that these are lines of love erupted from the moment of the bombing of the Saints Church in January 2011 until the opening of the new Cathedral in 2018 by President Abdelfattah Al Sisi. As a Coptic citizen, I accept such lovely gifts including his writings and TV program in which he discusses problems of citizenship as a loyal Egyptian citizen. The book also talks about the church and its internal affairs as well as the Pope and the guardians of the faith. It also deals with the relation between the Pope and Sheikh of Al-Azhar as well as the position of the Salafis and the Muslim Brotherhood. He included dialogues with His Holiness Pope Twadros II, and His Holiness Pope Shenouda III, in addition to a number of meetings with a number of Egypt thinkers.

There is no doubt that Egypt has gained a lot of experience in dealing with terrorist attacks. This was revealed during the crises of Al-Rawda mosque. It was such a brutal attack that caused a great loss of lives (311 martyrs and more than 100 wounded). The terrorist had developed weapons more than any criminal militias all over the world! During the crisis, media reporters tried to interrogate the imam of the mosque to get a scoop, but the media coverage was accurate in general and the officials did a good job in the crisis. The real problem is the lack of reform of the cultural and religious discourse that President Abdul Fattah al-Sisi called to fix three years ago but in vain. The religious discourse is not even able to reach to the public. Therefore, the simple people remain the precious hunting of the fanatics and extremists.

No one succeeded is a banner that was hanged on the doors of private schools in the sixties, where private schools were the solution and refuge for those with low grades. At that time, our government schools were an example of success unlike its current really bad situation. I remember this frustrating sign while remembering the following scenes: Scene 1: President Sadat confessing he left the extremists tampering with the future and capabilities of the country. He announced in a famous speech the arrest of Christian and Islamic leaders including Pope Shenouda III which was received by a hysterical and joyful round of applauds by members of the Parliament.

On the occasion of the new instructions issued by some bishops to prevent girls and women from wearing certain clothes inside churches, I would like to present this story in a short way, which was published in the photographer s magazine on August 26, 1927. The magazine reads: "A delegation of Italian women met with His Holiness Pope of the Vatican asking for his blessing and support in their fight against indecent fashion considering it corrupted taste. Head of the delegation said that women should spread awareness and awaken their conciseness. For his part, Pope said in a very brief speech that such act is part of the role of women in the society.

As we face our problems in Egypt, we may stop by offering solutions to them without really applying these solutions. We may believe these solutions will solve the problems, but they really don’t. Such illusion of solving our problems should be turned into reality. These solutions may include to establish a Council of citizenship, or to let the National Council for Human Rights do the job? Should we establish a higher committee that includes the sheikh of Al-Azhar and Coptic Pope, or should a committee of sages do the job away from clergy? Should we activating the code of press honor, or apply mechanisms union accountability?

As some of our MPs are calling to legalize virginity check on university students and non-criminalization of female genital mutilation, the Egyptian women are supposed to fight for their freedom like their mothers did many years ago. Egyptian women should remember «Merritt Nate» the first queen to take control in history, Khentkaus, Queen of Ancient Egypt during the 4th dynasty. They may also remember Nitocris, the last pharaoh of ancient Egypt's Sixth Dynasty, and Sobekneferu, the Egyptian woman reigning as pharaoh after the death of her brother Amenemhat IV. Hatshepsut was the fifth pharaoh of the Eighteenth Dynasty of Egypt and the second female pharaoh in history. There were other great female rulers in Egyptian history like Nefertiti, Nefertari, Cleopatra and Shajar al-Durr that modern women should be proud of.

After the revolution of July 23, 1952, the headlines of newspapers called to trial those who used their influence and corrupted the political life. Newspapers called to deprive those of citizenship, political rights, and public jobs and compel them to return the money they took. The result was not quite good since corruption increased supported by the successive governments. The same calls were repeated after the revolutions of January 25. Major General Ahmed Abdel Halim, security expert, said that political corruption has a general definition which is violating legality in all its forms. This proves that having a definition for political corruption is very hard. However, we should not think about exceptional laws thinking this is the only way to fight corruption. We have committed this mistake after the retardation of 1967.

I was delighted to hear the following statement of His Eminence Bishop Rafael, secretary of the Holy Synod. He said: “Orthodox teaching is against occult. Please make sure before spreading any news. Such obsession does not glorify God and doesn’t benefit our faith. On the contrary, it gives a negative impression about the Orthodox faith. The Holy Fathers handed us over dignified, practical and respectable faith. Miracles and revelations are not common events, but the real miracles in our faith are the Holy Bible, the Eucharist, piety and love of God and people in addition to the practice of virtue.

Although "Tiran and Sanafir" crisis has escalated and grew bigger very fast like a snow ball, which spoiled the achievement claimed by the Egyptian administration by the visit of the Saudi King to Cairo. The reactions to the crisis exposed failure and ignorance of many public figures. However, the religious institutions refused to comment, support or oppose. Al-Azhar and the Church announced that they don’t have comment on such political decision since they only work in spiritual matters. However, many Egyptians had comments including professors who know nothing about the matter and even changed their points of views by changing the televisions they were hosted at.