In April 2013, the Cathedral of St. Mark in Abbasiya was attacked and 3 Copts were killed and 84 were injured. The perpetrators were likely searching for weapons in the church or Coptic women who have converted into Islam and are still trapped in the church according to many stories spread by fanatics. They were likely searching for a reason to justify their attacks on Christian houses and churches. Ever since, the fascist regime was collapsing and this attack was a step towards overthrowing the regime of the Muslim Brotherhood. During the transitional period from July 2013 to June 2014, Copts were subject to many sectarian attacks as a price to pay by the Copts for supporting President Abdul Fattah al-Sisi, and they are still supporting him.

While we are close to June 30th, we still have the same argument about this date and if it was revolution or military coup and because I don’t want to go further in this argument I want to focus in more deep thoughts related to both terms. For those who consider it as revolution, I want to ask them many question, are we better than before? Is our economic, social and political life is better than before, Did Egyptian get what they demonstrate against?, did we achieve any progress during 3 years from June 30th until now?

For years, prices in Egypt are going up and never stop increasing. This is indeed very hard if you think about it. But the real problem is that about 30 percent of Egypt’s population lives below the poverty line and the increasing prices make them suffer more and more. Yesterday, the government announced that there is no intention to raise the prices of gasoline, diesel and butane gas. Yet, today the Council of Ministers of Egypt approved petrol new price list imposed on gasoline, diesel and butane gas.

God has never said that faith will be easy, but he has mentioned the difficult conditions and expensive costs to follow him. He also invited us to calculate the maintenance. To be both believer and patriot, this has its impact on the relation between the Coptic church and nation. At the events of Omrania in 2010, the Cairo police assaulted peaceful protesters who were seeking to protect a church under construction, and killed two of the protesters. Demonstrations erupted in front of the administrative building and 154 Coptic Christian citizens were arrested. At that moment, the Coptic youth went out of the churches for the first time in modern history. After the church of the saints were bombed in 2011, demonstrations erupted against Mubarak and his government. On January 25, the first Coptic man who was injured was called Mina Nagy and the first Coptic martyrs in January 28th, Mina Daniel, even before the Salafis and the Muslim Brotherhood joined the revolution against Mubarak’s regime.

The Egyptian parliament has a great history, with many politicians leading it since the 19th century. It has always respected freedom of speech and reason. Members of the Egyptian parliament have always used a decent language to express the harmony of the political life in this great country. I say this as I am full of sorrow feelings and frustration for what our parliament reached nowadays. In fact, I tried many times to avoid writing about the performance of this parliament, but I couldn’t stop myself upon watching the final discussion of the Convention on the demarcation of the border between Egypt and Saudi Arabia.

Reforms in General shouldn’t take one shape. Reforms shouldn’t be only by increasing the prices especially on the poor classes. It’s very understandable that any reform will affect without any doubt the poor class but if we didn’t work in lighten these affects that might lead to social tension and may be troubles in the short and long term. One of the main problem that face Egypt right now that the political regime doesn’t even talk to the people or tell Egyptian what are they willing to do and why, on contrary they deal with the Egyptian as sub-ordinate. Egyptian should be Number one in any decision made by the government or the president, however, this is not the case and it seems that Sisi didn’t learn from the previous lessons. In conclusion I want to assure that any reforms will not be effective unless the society and community accept it and feel that they are part of the process not objectives.

London has recently witnessed several terrorist attacks, most of which ISIS has claimed responsibility for, but this week there was another attack against the Muslim community in London as man rams car into crowd killing one and injuring 12 Muslims as they were leaving a mosque after performing special prayers during the holy month of Ramadan. The victims were innocent people as always, but this time, the terrorist attack targeted Mulim people coming out of a mosque. Indeed, the Muslim community was shocked to have its share of the terrorist attacks in London. The horrible incident reminds us of several attacks against Copts in Egypt; Nag Hamadi, Warraq and the Saints Church in Alexandria to name a few, but the reaction of the Muslim majority in Egypt was a little bit different from the one of the Muslim minority in London though the attacks are similar.

In January 1977, Ahmed Bahaa Eddin wrote an Arab editorial about the critical situation after the glorious victory of October 1973. He warned against several threats that he saw a revolution at hand. The regime clashed with the people and Sadat had to visit Jerusalem following the American Administration to become a basis in our foreign policy and democracy became a fake play in our country. On the other hand, Saddam Hussein led the Arabs to fight against Iran and then occupied Kuwait to face his destiny and get his army destroyed and his country divided. Iraq ever since became a land for civil war and destruction. Then we had our war against terrorism after the Muslim Brotherhood took office in Egypt. The revolution of June 30 came to remove them from power and to demand the Minister of Defense Abdul Fattah al-Sisi to run for presidency and fix the situation.

When we hear the word Copts, we think of Egypt. Copts have a long history plagued by blood and oppression after they embraced Christianity in Egypt. The Christians in Egypt were called Copts as they belong to the land of Egypt as the word Copts means the people of Egypt. With the entry of Islam in Egypt, Christians were called Copts against Muslims. Now, they represent the largest minority in the Middle East and the largest Christian community in the region. Copts are estimated at 8 million Copts in Egypt and about 2 million Copts all over the world (most of them live in the United States). Copts had their own language which is one of the oldest.

During King Salman s important visit to Cairo on April 7, 2016, which lasted for five days, ten agreements were signed which will bring about radical changes in the region, such as the construction of a bridge between the Kingdom and Egypt to link the two continents of Asia and Africa and bring billions of dollars to Egypt. The Egyptian President Abdul Fattah al-Sisi signed the bridge agreement based on the republican decree signed by Mohamed Hosni Mubarak in 1990 that admits the two islands belong to the Saudi Arabia. This decision came after consulting the specialized committees headed by the Supreme National Committee for the Sea. However, many countries and organizations conspired against Egypt and the Saudi Arabia leading to sedition, but the two big sisters overcame such evil plans of division in the Middle East.

An Egyptian parliamentary committee was scheduled to meet this week to debate a law that would ban parents from using “western names. This has happened before in several countries including the Saudi Arabia that banned 50 names in 2014 including Alis, Lynda and Eline! Advocates of the new law said that using such Western names and abandoning Arabic ones will lead to an undesired and radical change in the Egyptian society and culture. Thus, they prefer names like Ali, Omar and Abu Talib which came originally from the Arab peninsula, rather than Mina and Ramsis that came from our Pharonic ancestors.

Recently the parliament agreed on Terran and Sanafi treaty which will give the right to Saudi Arabia to have the sovereignty on these two Islands. Sisi in many occasions accused all Egyptians that they don’t have honor and dignity and he is the only one have it among Egyptian. We back as always to the king authority who believes that he is the best and the right person in all cases.

Finally, brethren, farewell. Become complete. Be of good comfort, be of one mind, live in peace; and the God of love and peace will be with you. These are the words of St. Paul to pave the way before a successful man as described by Pope Tawadros II in his sermon last Wednesday. God is the core of our joy since he grants us the salvation of sin. Jesus Christ is the way to this salvation, thus we should always rejoice in him who blesses our way, health, ministry, work and family. We shouldn’t allow anybody to take away such joy. He called us to become complete in our relationship with the church and its sacraments and ministry. The church is the best way to save our children from the world and fill them with the holy spirit.

As I celebrated my birthday, I thought about the past and traveled through time and space from Los Angeles to Assiut. The older people used to tell the children stories about their great old times where life was so cheap. Our dreams were very simple as computer cell phones and television were not invented yet. Only the rich people had radio at their house. They listened to plays and football matches and the audience shouted with joy or sorrow according to their football affiliation. As children, we were dealing with a currency that does not exist nowadays, but we saved out of it to rent bicycles once a week. We had very simple toys and games for boys and others for girls. Our neighborhood was a narrow road and the houses on both sides consisted often of two floors, and all the families in the street were Christians.

I was surprised by the statement of the Holy Synod last week in which it decided to celebrate martyrs of the Coptic Church in the modern history on February 15th, which marks the martyrdom of 21 Copts by ISIS in Libya. They chose that day since this is the only time Coptic Christies were killed without the involvement of the Egyptian regime. The regime performed air strike on ISIS in Libya and built a church for the martyrs in their home village. Thus, they didn’t chose the anniversary of other sectarian incidents where Copts were killed based on their religious identity such as the Saints Church, Maspero, St. Peter Chapel, St. George Church in Tanta, or the martyrs of St. Samuel terrorist attack. The statement decided to avoid embarrassing the regime of Mubarak and al-Sisi.

The terrorism that we see growing among the Western part of the world is equally heartbreaking and troublesome, but for different reasons that I want to explain here. First off, let s be clear. In Egypt, you have 90% of the population that is Muslim. The other 10% is Christian/Other denominations. The victims, as mentioned previously, are the Christians. The West, on the other hand, is primarily made up of Christians and Atheists. A large amount of the population, I can say maybe 35% is Atheist/Mixed. In this group, I do also include “apathetic” Christians that are not practicing Christians. Christians who do not have the first clue about the teachings of the Church, or of peace etc… The other 55% I can say are Christians and then 5% Muslim. The Muslim population is growing, but is still relatively small. The Western mentality is not that of “Christianity” although that s the foundation for these countries, it s more about, “let everyone just do their own thing and mind your own business”

There is no doubt that what Saudi Arabia is doing with Qatar is not a simple cut for diplomatic relations, but an assassination. Saudi Arabia has prevented Qatar from using airspace, water and borders though it almost share all borders with it. On the other hand, Iran is not a very good alternative since it will be a higher cost of transportation. Therefore, Saudi Arabia has given the worst hit, followed by the United Arab Emirates and Bahrain. As for the Egyptian decision, it came too late following Egyptian-Saudi agreement during the secret visit by al-Jubeir, the Saudi foreign minister to Egypt, on the night of the Egyptian Gulf turn against Qatar. We still remember what happened in 2015 when Egypt accused Qatar of involvement in the killing of the 21 Christians in Libya, and terrorism in Sinai and Libya. At that time, members of the Gulf Cooperation Council refused the Egyptian statements and forced Egypt to withdraw its accusations.

One day before the holy month of Ramadan started, I wrote that Coptic Christians love this month and share the celebration of this month with Muslims considering it more cultural tradition than a religious one. Yet, the terrorist attack in Minya hours after publishing the article decided to change that. Those terrorists decided to kill 29 innocent people including children who were going to visit St. Samuel monastery that Christians should remember they are the favorite prey of the terrorist groups that kill in the name of Islam. Moreover, it decided to ruin the celebrations of that holy month, just like it did couple of years ago when they killed Egyptian soldiers in Rafah while they were eating their breakfast.