Current Events
All of a sudden, war breaks out again.
April, 2019
Unexpectedly and almost at the same time, the situation in Lebanon and northern Syria deteriorated dramati cally in the middle of October. Adon Nabih Naaman experienced both at first hand. The young Syrian pastor had just passed his examinations at the Near East School of Theology in Beirut and was responsible for the Protestant parish in Malkieh in the north east of Syria. In a Facebook post, he writes how quickly life can be deluged with conflict.
Holy Family Trail in Egypt: Five Sites Under Development Program
April, 2019
According to local Egyptian news outlets, the Ministry of Local development has announced its program to develop five archeological sites on the flight of the Holy Family’s trail.
The decision was announced on Monday; it involves the Monastery of Bishop Bishoy, the Church of the Virgin in Maadi, the Monastery of El Suryan, the Paromeos Monastery and the Church of Abu Sarja in Masr Al Qadim.
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There are various forms of tourism, the backbone of the country’s economy, existing in Egypt; local and international tourists indulge in cultural and leisure tourism although the government is promoting the country’s potential for medical and religious tourism as well. (continue . . . )
May, 2018
In August of each year, Saint Mary is especially important among Coptic Orthodox Christians in Egypt. From the 7th till the 21st, Orthodox Christians – like many other Christians in Egypt and the world – commemorate the actions of the Apostles of Jesus many centuries before them. According to the Synaxarium of the Coptic Orthodox Church, the Apostles fasted for two weeks to see the assumption of Mary into heaven, one more time after St. Thomas had initially witnessed this miraculous incident while he was on an evangelical mission to India. (continue . . . )
January, 2018
A strip mall 15 minutes down the highway from Manhattan is the last place I expected to hear the language spoken by Jesus Christ. But northern New Jersey is one of the places where Syriac Christians, driven from the Middle East by violence and persecution, have come to call home over the past few decades. If Jacob Hanikhe has his way, it will also remain one of the few places where Aramaic, an ancient tongue found throughout the Talmud and Gospels, is a living language. (continue . . . )
July, 2016
One of the major challenges of Syriac and other Middle Eastern Christian communities is how to keep their younger members actively involved with the church. Secularizing tendencies, intermarriage with non-Syriacs and even political activism within the Syriac/Assyrian/Aramean community may keep young people away from commitment to the local and transnational church.
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At a more fundamental level, the way the church used to function in the Middle East is not easily transposed into western societies, and if fact also poses problems in the current Middle East. The days are over when religious belonging was just an inescapable element of one’s societal status that no one thought of changing – whether you actually were a believer or not. Ritual participation, chanting the songs in Syriac, making the movements, smelling the incense, tasting the bread and the wine, formed a strong basis upon which communal belonging and individual faith could foster, making sense of the world without having to explain it. (continue . . . )
