Free Republic

The recent beheading of 21 Egyptian Coptic Christian workers in Libya by Islamic State (IS) affiliates prompted a conversation with Joseph Hakim, President of the International Christian Union (ICU), an umbrella organization that seeks to secure the wellbeing and survival of Middle Eastern Christians. Hakim is a Lebanese-born Orthodox Christian and a proud American.

I am sure that all of our readers are aware of the recent massacre in Libya of a group of Egyptian Copts, who were killed for their faith by Islamic terrorists. The Patriarch of Alexandria, His Holiness Pope Tawadros II, has officially recognized them as martyrs, and ordered that their commemoration be inserted into the Synaxarium; their feast will be kept on February 15th, the same day as the Presentation of the Lord in the Alexandrian Rite. The title “New Martyr” was originally used in the East for those killed by heretical Christian rulers, but has subsequently been extended to...

Hanna Asaad, a network engineer in Fairfax, Va., grew up in the village of Aloor in southern Egypt. He was able to immigrate to the United States several years ago, but his best friend and cousin, Samuel Alham, sought work as a laborer in nearby Libya, like many other Coptic Christians in the impoverished region. Shortly after Christmas, Alham and 20 of his fellow Coptic laborers were kidnapped by Islamic State militants in Libya. In mid-February, they were marched to a Mediterranean beach in handcuffs and orange prison jumpsuits. Then they were beheaded with knives as a video camera recorded...

The stunning icon here depicts the martyrs and was created by Egyptian American artist Tony Rezk. It appears on the website for the Coptic Orthodox Diocese of Los Angeles. From Vatican Radio:  The Coptic Orthodox Church has announced that the murder of the 21 Egyptian Christians killed by the so-called Islamic State in Libya will be commemorated in its Church calendar.Pope Tawadros II announced that the names of the martyrs will be inserted into the Coptic Synaxarium, the Oriental Church’s equivalent to the Roman Martyrology. This procedure is also equivalent to canonization in the Latin Church.According to terrasanta.net, the martyrdom of the...

Video of 21 Egyptian Coptic Christians being marched along a Libyan beach before being beheaded by black-clad members of ISIS is hard for any civilized person to watch, but experts who made it through the sickening, five-minute clip told FoxNews.com Friday they came to the same conclusion: The footage was faked. No one holds out hope the victims, mostly poor fishermen who had gone to Libya to scratch out a living, are still alive. But several anomalies in the video, which was posted online Feb. 15, indicated to trained eyes that at least some of the production was done on...

A screen shot from a video released by Islamic State militants on Feb. 15. “They were killed simply for the fact that they were Christians. … The blood of our Christian brothers and sisters is a testimony which cries out to be heard.” Pope Francis responded today to the news that 21 Egyptian Christians have been beheaded by Islamic State militants. “Their blood confesses Christ,” the Holy Father said to a visiting delegation representing the Church of Scotland. “The martyrs belong to all Christians.” On Sunday, ISIS released a graphic video showing the beheading of 21 Coptic Christians on...

Yahoo Canada News - "HORRIBLE PHOTOS reveal ISIS marched 21 Coptic Christians to beach, beheaded them all" Image via Twitter/ @trscoop / The Right Scoop CAIRO (Reuters) - Islamic State released a video on Sunday purporting to show the beheading of a group of Egyptian Christians kidnapped in Libya, violence likely to deepen Cairo's concerns over security threats from militants thriving in the neighboring country's chaos. Egypt's state news agency MENA quoted the spokesman for the Coptic Church as confirming that 21 Egyptian Christians believed to be held by Islamic State were dead. In the video, militants in black...

The Islamic State has announced the killing of 21 Eyptian Christians who were abducted from Libya early in January. A report issued on the internet by the Islamic State said that the Coptic Christians were killed in “revenge for the Muslim women persecuted by Coptic crusaders in Egypt.” The reference was evidently to an incident in which two Egyptian women married to Copts were allegedly pressured to repudiate Islam. The Egyptian government has not confirmed the deaths of the 21 kidnapping victims, but fears that the internet report is accurate. Additional sources for this storySome links will take you to...

A 1,500-year-old book that contains a previously unknown gospel has been deciphered. The ancient manuscript may have been used to provide guidance or encouragement to people seeking help for their problems, according to a researcher who has studied the text. Written in Coptic, an Egyptian language, the opening reads (in translation): "The Gospel of the lots of Mary, the mother of the Lord Jesus Christ, she to whom Gabriel the Archangel brought the good news. He who will go forward with his whole heart will obtain what he seeks. Only do not be of two minds

An ancient gospel has been discovered in the pages of a diminutive book dating back to the 6th century. The text, dubbed the 'Gospel of the Lots of Mary' is written in Coptic and contains oracles that would have been used to provide support and reassurance to people seeking help for problems. It is not a gospel in the traditional sense, because it doesn't predominantly teach about Christ, and its translator suggests that the discovery could rewrite the ancient definition and purpose of gospels. The ancient book was given to Harvard University's Sackler Museum in 1984 by Beatrice Kelekian, in...

Egyptian Christians have seen notable gains under the government of President Abd al-Sisi, the spokesman for the country’s bishops tells the AsiaNews service. Father Rafic Greiche pointed to three new building permits for Catholic churches. He reported that permits for Christian churches were never granted during the rule of former President Hosni Mubarak, nor under the government that followed him, which was dominated by Islamic fundamentalists. Some applications for permits to build churches date back more than a decade, Father Greiche said.

It is astonishing that scholars of religion refer so little to the Manichaean faith, which in its day -- roughly from the third century AD through the fourteenth century -- was a fully fledged world religion, which interacted with Christianity, Buddhism, Islam, Zoroastrianism and Judaism. At various times, its adherents could be found across the whole of Eurasia, from France to China. It also created a substantial body of scriptures and commentaries, most of which are now lost. Manichaeanism (Manichaeism) is, I believe, the only example of a world religion that has arisen and then vanished entirely, seemingly without trace....

While America is Busy with Climate Change, Christ is Getting Ready to Land On Earth And Rescue A Specific Church. But Which Church? The Answer should Shock You By Shoebat Foundation on September 22, 2014 By Walid Shoebat (Shoebat Exclusive) While America is busy with Climate Change, Christ is getting ready to land on planet earth to rescue a specific Church, but which Church? But before we discuss this crucial topic, this is America taking action on Climate Change in which nearly half a million of us marched in New York City: While, you might think, “the world is going...

It has been 13 years since 9/11 and the West is still reluctant to link the non-ending parade of jihad groups with Islam. The West is also in denial about the similarities all radical Islamic groups share. It is important for the West to realize that there is a natural division of labor between the different terror groups. Some groups specialize in terror against non-Muslims and Western governments while others specialize in terrorizing Arab governments that refused to follow Sharia. But the truly sophisticated groups are those who reside in the West, calling themselves ‘moderate’ while at the same time...

The internet has been abuzz with intriguing headlines announcing that scholars have determined that the so-called “Gospel of Jesus’ Wife” papyrus is “authentic” and that there is “no forgery evidence” in the manuscript. What exactly does this mean? And should Christians be concerned that a new discovery might contradict the biblical account and undermine their faith? Actually, the report from scholars working with the Harvard Divinity School found that the manuscript is much younger than previously thought – in other words, it is even further removed from the time of the New Testament than scholars originally believed – meaning that,...

In 2012, Harvard researcher Karen King revealed the "Gospel of Jesus' Wife." A small piece of papyrus, the lightly worn document was written in Coptic Egyptian, with parts missing and ink faded, and didn't say much. But what it did say, wrote Ariel Sabar in Smithsonian Magazine two years ago was enough to “send jolts through the world of biblical scholarship—and beyond.” The fragment’s 33 words, scattered across 14 incomplete lines, leave a good deal to interpretation. But in King’s analysis, and as she argues in a forthcoming article in the Harvard Theological Review, the “wife” Jesus refers to is probably Mary Magdalene, and Jesus...

Eyewitnesses have given a harrowing account of the murder in Cairo of a young Coptic Christian woman, hauled out of her car and beaten and stabbed to death by a Muslim mob, apparently targeted because of a cross hanging from her rear-view mirror. The incident occurred in the Cairo suburb of Ain Shams after mosque prayer services on Friday, ... 25-year-old Mary Sameh George was attacked in her car near a church, where she planned to deliver medicine to an ill and elderly woman. Protestors climbed onto her car, collapsing the roof, then hauled her from the vehicle, beating and...

On Tuesday 7 January, Coptic Orthodox Christians – who comprise 90 percent of Egypt's Christians – will break their 43-day fast and celebrate Christmas. The festival comes almost two weeks after most Western denominations, including Catholics and Protestants, held their celebrations on 25 December. Ahram Online asked Bishop Abram of the Fayoum Diocese to explain why there was a difference in the dates; he stressed that the difference in fact results from the use of different calendars, not from any underlying theological dispute. Although the exact date of Jesus' birth was -- and remains -- unknown, within the first few...

For the past two Sundays, hundreds of Pakistanis of all faiths have formed human chains in front of churches during mass – first in Karachi, then in Lahore. This solidarity movement was launched in reaction to the terrorist attack that killed 81 worshippers at a church in Peshawar, making it the deadliest ever perpetrated against the country’s Christian minority. Militant groups linked to the Pakistani Taliban said they carried out the September 22 bomb attack in response to US-led drone strikes. Christians have been targeted for their faith before, but previous attacks have usually taken the form of mob violence...

Over 200 Coptic Christians in Nashville, Tenn. took to the streets Monday in a mass demonstration calling out the Obama administration for its lack of response and begging Americans to “pray for Egypt” while calling for an end to the terrorism inflicted by the Muslim Brotherhood. Chanting, “Obama, Obama, don’t you care? Christian blood is everywhere,” and “We love Egypt. We love U.S.,” the crowd also shouted “‘eid wahda,’ an Egyptian phrase that translates as “one hand,” meaning that the Egyptian people, both Christians and Muslims, were united with the army against terrorism, which they blamed on the Muslim Brotherhood,”...