Comments on: I Like Coptic.

By: Nathan

Nathan — Wed, 23 Feb 2011 00:30:32 +0000

hmmm…

Jesus’ agenda was never to overthrow the established order, so if he ‘lived in Egypt today’ he would never have ‘been leading the protests in Tahrir Square’.

Your disheartened attitude toward HH Pope Shenouda is one that I have heard many times since the Egyptian uprising, but you really need to think about it…
While the Church doesn’t mingle in politics, to survive it needs to play the political game. I have no doubt that HH’s ’support’ of Mubarak was needed for the favour of the Church. As a Church, we support, we work with and we pray for the leaders of our country, whatever the circumstance may be.
And just think for minute, what if the uprising did not see the results that it did, and instead of the jubilance in the streets, the Nile were filled with the blood of millions for treason and dissidence…what would then have happened to the Copts if HH had spoken out against Mubarak? Who’s blood would’ve been shed first? Who would’ve bore the grunt of the iron fist? The Copts of course!!
HH cannot, if for nothing more than the safety of his people; rebel against the established order in a country where they are alredy discriminated against. He has to ‘play it safe’, he has to play the political game if his minority are to survive. It is absolutely foolish to expect him to show anything but support.

And it didn’t matter in the end anyway. The people got what they wanted. But like I said in the other thread, they should be careful what they wish for. Who knows what the next regime or government will be like….better the devil you know, I reckon…

By: Akmal Saleh

Thu, 17 Feb 2011 09:34:59 +0000

I have been moved and inspired by the events of the passed few weeks in Egypt. It was amazing to see the courage displayed by the Egyptian people protesting against the brutality and injustices of the Mubarak regime
I was deeply saddend however to read that Pope Shenouda publicly supported Mubarak and his courrupt regime on state television
How can a man of god support such a tyrant ?
How can a christian leader publicly support a man who has reintroduced torture to the modern world, and turned Egypt in to the world capital for human rights abuses ?
How can a man who claims to be representing the teachings of christ support a dictator who in his time in power accumulated a personal wealth of seventy billon dollars , while the majority of the Egyptian people are living on less than two dollars a day ?
I ask myself this question , If Jesus lived in Egypt today ,would he have supported Mubarak or the protesters . I have no doubt in my mind that he would’ve been leading the protests in Tahrir Square , hand in hand with the poor the vulnerable the downtrodden, the Christian and the Muslem
He would’ve voiced his disproval of wrongdoings, oppression, and injustices loudly and courageously whatever the consequence
What a shame

By: Facebook User

Sun, 13 Dec 2009 11:54:37 +0000

Thanks for mentioning e-sword. It is a pretty interesting software. Was wondering if there is any “Commentary” that is Orthodox, that we can utilise with it? I think at Shenouda’s Monastery, Abouna Anthony had some stuff for the New Testament on his e-sword?

GB!

By: Romani Sergyos

Thu, 19 Nov 2009 00:13:40 +0000

Mina , George and anonymous,it is great to hear your honest straightforward views … it might be a message for me from God …. please do not get me wrong , somebody has to be the bad bloke and point the finger at the problems , hoping things move in the right direction for our community ….. for years now , we were hoping church committees do their work in this area but i believe they learned to agree all the time or could be joined the apathy group as well ???!! God knows , too much ????!!…. anyhow it is not an easy task for anybody or committee to point the finger constructively and get the message across and get the work done …. !!!? back to our issue , first it is good to see involvement and that the blog nourish with different constructive views and the most important above all it is a healthy sign that a lot started to break the ice and that zone of lack of interest and at the end of the day who wants to improve will improve, every day we learn … .. …we can not deny that every where all communities and societies starve all the time for improvement to achieve the best of the best and it does not matter the background or education or age or sex or whatever for its members as always there is a room for improvement for all , so do you think our church came from vacuum with all those courses and lectures of awareness and education such as bible studies ,Christian Counseling , couple marriage education , middle age crisis , drugs , specialist people go and come and talk about relationships , domestic violence , high rate of divorces , separations ,specialist gambling and you name it such a lot of crisis and attitudinal problems .. so give it a thought , those front liners priests and those positive and honest people working behind the scenes and all those people volunteering their effort and time ,they know what they are doing in this specific area and i believe they have their own statistics, figures and plans .. i believe it is great and all of us as a community has a role to play and encourage those positive and constructive approach !!! second our culture is very ignorant in positive relationships , positive attitude “including myself at this age “at all levels and at different ages and in different areas in our life ..our church is strengthening those weakness hoping to prevent a lot of future problems which is great to have a healthy and happy community with less problems …still a lot of areas in our church needs a lot of attention and hard work … we rely on you young blokes and your positive involvement to do something …may our lord Jesus Christ guide us all to play our role and do our bit in our church community as real responsible and accountable Christians….i feel i can not give and take any more in this great blog …cheers ….

By: Nathan

Nathan — Wed, 18 Nov 2009 04:47:19 +0000

Romani, there were many books used by the different Churches before 325 AD which are not found in the Bible today. Sts Paul and Peter and John had supposedly written other epistles which were read, and Apostles like St Barnabus had also supposedly written an epistle which was commonly read in the Churches and is referred to in the writings of Fathers like Athanasius.
St Paul had supposedly also written his own version of his own heavenly Revelation. Then we have the Gnostic Gospel, which although unpopular and the cause of some contraversy, were also being circulated and copies of which have even been unearthed in monasteries like St Catherine’s in Sinai.
At the first Ecumenical Council, the Church decided that it was going to deem canonical a set of these books to be used by all dioceses, and the books which today make up the Bible, as well as those books known as the Deuterocanonical books were deemed Scripture.

The Church was established at Penetcost, before any of these books were written. The Gosepls and the Epistles were written in the years up to about 100 AD, when the Church had already been established.

Jesus established the Church, not the Bible. The Bible is the Church’s gift to the world, and not the other way around.

By: Romani Sergyos

Wed, 18 Nov 2009 00:57:57 +0000

Nathan thanks for this great valuable feed back information ..just i wonder what type of books used during the first 325 years of Christianity , i mean in that period before the official gatherings of the bible ???!! i wonder when our lord preached the good new with his disciples passed on the good news and then disciples received the holy spirit and the good news kept going all over the place , i believe all the information of the bible kept passing verbally from generation to generation till gathered in the bible …so the bottom line those preachings passed verbally before establishing the church and when then the church established on those gathered guide lines of the bible … those are my thoughts , i wonder if i am in the right track ???! so we come back to the way around that the church is the product of the bible ??? mate it is a bit confusing ???!!

By: Nathan

Nathan — Tue, 17 Nov 2009 04:55:29 +0000

I seem to again be the cause of a topic veering off course…anyway…

The view that the Bible is the sole authority is what brought on the Protestant Reformation.
We do source our Christian values from the Gospels and Epistles to be sure, but the Church produced the Bible, not the other way around. The Church existed for 325 years before the Bible as we know it came into existance. Before that time, there were different books and scrolls being read and circulated throughtout different Churches. It wasn’t until 325 AD at Nicea that the Univeral Church decided to have all Churches using the same texts, and the Bible as we know it was compiled with those texts which were deemed divinely inspired.
If the Church is the product of the Bible, then we should, as do the Muslims of their Koran; believe that the Bible descended from heaven as it is and that the Church was built around it. We know that is not the case. We know the Bible was written by different persons who were inspired by God to write the words they did.
The Bible is therefore a product of a Church which had already existed, compiled from different writings of different men who tried to explain or retell the Christian faith. Who knows, maybe someday in future another book may be written or discovered which will be deemed by an Ecumenical Council as Scripture, although I doubt that will ever be the case.

Anyway…that’s enough from me, I’m going back to the topic….I LIKE COPTIC….

By: Romani Sergyos

Tue, 17 Nov 2009 02:22:25 +0000

Mate Nathan what you wrote is great as our christian way of life and all those great fruits of the holy spirit are from all those great christian values which we got from the bible and as well what passed by hand from our holy fathers over the years ….. just that point that church is not based on the bible is not clear for me however i believe our main guide lines in our christian way of life based entirely on the bible and its great values and promises …i believe the church is one of the products of the bible with all its sacraments ” the good news ” the life of company with its head our lord Christ and all of us the members in that holy body … i believe the bible teaches us every thing A to Z in the right and the wrong in our way of life …i hope somebody else might share with own view and experience so we can learn more … every day we learn something …God bless …

By: Nathan

Nathan — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 23:22:47 +0000

Romani, following Christ because of his great ideals and values is not a valid reason because if you search you will find many religious figures, and many religions with the same ideals and values which we take for granted as being exclusively Christian.
You follow Christ because you have been given a grace to believe, a grace without which Christianity would perhaps seem foolish. This grace is available, but you only have genuinely want it or search for it. For those of us baptised and given this grace as children it is often taken for granted, but it is there.

There is a common misunderstanding among Orthodox Christians that the Bible is the be-all-and-end-all of the Christian faith.
The Church is not based on the Bible; the Bible is a product of the Church, produced by the Churches Apostles and Prophets. Divinely inspired, to be sure, but it is not the only thing through which the Church bases its teaching and doctrine. The Church relies not only on the Bible, but also the Holy Tradition and the Holy Fathers which were also divinely inspired and instrumental in establishing Christian doctrine.

Anyway, that’s off topic.
I too like Coptic!! I don’t understand it, I can’t read it, write it or speak it. But I love hearing it spoken!!

By: mina saidden

mina saidden — Sun, 15 Nov 2009 12:10:51 +0000

Copts don’t show love or apreciation to one another??????
What kind of people have you been hanging around buddy?