Catholic churches and schools are offering shelter to Coptic Orthodox families fleeing ISIS in Egypt’s north Sinai region.
Fr Rafic Greiche, spokesman for the Coptic Catholic Church, said the aid in the city of Ismailia was being offered with the help of Caritas.
He told the Catholic News Service that ISIS militants were now “strongly entrenched” in north Sinai, having been allowed by Hamas and the Muslim Brotherhood organisations to use tunnels from the Gaza Strip.
Fr Greiche praised local Muslims for helping embattled Christians amid the terrorism.
“Ordinary Muslims are kind and try to help however they can – they’re often first on the scene, rescuing the injured and taking them to hospitals,” he said.
Fr Greiche said he believed that Egyptian authorities were committed to protecting Christians against Islamists.
“You can never do enough against jihadist and terrorist attacks, which come, like any criminal acts, at a time no one can foresee,” the priest said. “But while no country can be fully secure, I think there’s will on the government side to act decisively against these constant attempts to destabilise Egypt.”
Britain’s Coptic Orthodox leader Bishop Angaelos said that from December until February, 40 Coptic Christians had been murdered in Egypt.
“These horrific attacks have gone largely unnoticed by the international community, but Copts continue to suffer tragic violations daily,” he said.
Hundreds of Christians have fled north Sinai after a series of murders and death threats daubed on Christians’ homes.
Archbishop Chaput: Francis should answer the dubia
Archbishop Charles Chaput of Philadelphia has said it would be good for Pope Francis to answer the dubia, the request for clarification of his teaching on marriage by four cardinals.
In an interview with Crux, Archbishop Chaput was asked what he thought was at stake in the debate over marriage and Amoris Laetitia.
The document does not mention Communion for the remarried, but some bishops, including those of Malta and Germany, have claimed it authorises the practice.
Archbishop Chaput said that this teaching, and Jesus’s prohibition of adultery, could not be changed. “It seems to me that it’s impossible for us to contradict the words of Jesus, and it’s also impossible for a teaching to be true 20 years ago not to be true today when it’s the teachings of the pope,” he said.
“The teachings of Pope Francis can’t contradict the teachings of John Paul II when it is a matter of official teaching.”
Asked whether he would like the Pope to answer the dubia, Archbishop Chaput said: “Yes. I think it’s always good to answer questions.”
Priest martyred in 1969 recognised
Pope Francis has recognised the martyrdom of a priest who secretly shuttled Salesians to Italy out of communist-controlled Czechoslovakia in the 1950s. At the time religious orders were banned and members were sent to concentration camps. Fr Titus Zeman, a Salesian, was arrested and jailed. Although released from prison in 1964, he suffered ill health because of his imprisonment and died in 1969.
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