CHRISTIANS WAIT FOR EGYPT GOVERNMENT TO END A 160 YEAR BAN ON THE CONSTRUCTION OF NEW CHURCHES
While Muslims are facing a lot of discrimination and are finding an increase in legislations that restrict their religious freedom, Christians in Muslim-majority nations like Egypt have also been facing tough opposition and restrictions to practice their Christian faith. Things have scarcely changed in the 21st century. Even now, Christians in Egypt are fighting tough laws that restrict their freedom to build houses of worship.
Egypt has had a complete ban on building churches until around 160 years ago when the then sultan, under the directions of the Ottoman Caliphate, gave his permission to allow Christians to do so. Countries that are governed under the Sharia law do not allow any faith other than Islam to build their places of worship. This is what made the move of the sultan seem a step forward towards progress. Under the new ordnance, Christians who wanted to build churches had to seek the permission of the ruler of Egypt to do so. However, this step remained static at just that, because today, Egyptian Christians still have to seek permission from Egypt's ruler to build a church. The only difference is that the ruler is no longer a sultan, but a president. This draconian law made things worse for the Christian population of Egypt around 80 years ago when an amendment required the community to seek the permission of local Muslim bodies too, in addition to the president's approval. The proposed church would have to be built at a certain distance from the area's mosque, school, government offices or any other such public institutions. Needless to say, very few churches have been constructed so far and Christians end up meeting secretly in houses, with a constant fear of getting penalized heavily if discovered.
No comments:
Post a Comment