Largest Christian Gathering in Egypt in a Thousand Years

A thousand years is a long time. As far as we can tell, the prayer meeting last night that I attended in the cave church of St Simon, which they said had 70,000 [update: official count was 71,000] by the time I was leaving, was by far the largest Christian gathering in Egypt in over a thousand years.

Day of prayer egypt 11 11 11

This photo is taken in the overflow area outside the cave church. Photo by Wolfgang.

Another interesting observation: Apart from our group of friends that attended, I only saw one other foreigner there, a girl who walks up and asks me if I am TallSkinnyKiwi. Which I was. Small world.

Prayer egypt day

Photo of main sanctuary found here.

Andrew

Andrew Jones launched his first internet space in 1997 and has been teaching on related issues for the past 20 years. He travels all the time but lives between Wellington, San Francisco and a hobbit home in Prague.

10 Comments

  • ron cole says:

    Stunningly beauitiful.

  • Monica says:

    your one of the few sites talking about this…peaceful movements are rarely recorded by the media… if it bleeds it reads. We need more positive stories that show how people are working towards peace and reconciliation rather than violence. Thanks for sharing this – I hope some international news network picks it up

  • Brian Christensen says:

    Beautiful…..

  • Gary Manders says:

    Really amazing and inspiring. I so want to visit and pray there.

  • brambonius says:

    Wow, impressive! Why don’t I read stuff like this about the global church elsewere?
    Thousand years is a very long time indeed…I remember hearing the easter liturgy of the Norbertines at Tongerloo Abbey here in Flanders, which they said was unchanged for more than 900 years, and I couldn’t grasp that. But something like the greatest gathering of Christians in a thousand years is much greater…
    May God bless our coptic brothers and sisters!!

  • TSK –
    How did you find out about this gathering and the people reaching out in the Egyptian community elsewhere? I so want to connect up with these people! Please write me privately?

  • nevine.kolta@alston.com says:

    Your response Mr. truth overfaith..is really a sad one..you are really angry, if you don’t believe in something why don’t you occupy yourself with something else and refrain from insulting things/people who believe differently. The fact that you are so passionate in your anger tells me you are really struggling with what you believe in, I will pray for you..God bless you!

  • Barbara Leeson says:

    Thank you for covering this amazing and very encouraging event. It is so wonderful to hear something positive coming out of the Middle East! God bless Egypt and the Egyptian people.

  • Thanks for the post and it’s amazing!
    We’re Jesus.net Japan. I would like to translate and share this article and pictures with Japanese Christians and seekers.And also, I would like to the link for English readers to this article.
    Is it okay?

  • Andrew says:

    please take everything you want from this blog, including previous posts, and translate them for your website. go for it!
    i enjoyed my time teaching in Japan a few years ago. We were very encouraged by the emerging church there.
    any other countries out there – go ahead and translate and use it. no copyright. but i always appreciate a link back to the original article [here] so i can edit and correct if necessary.

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