Subtitles:
" The law made divorce lawful in cases of adultery and apostasy… the Catholic Church kept its special condition.
" The president of the Personal Status Court: "the bill puts an end to circumvention and reduces the number of divorces that does not comply with Christian law."
" Father Marcos Aziz: "the law of 1938 disagrees with the texts of the Bible… the solution will be in bringing the new law to light."
The only chance for any Coptic couples who would like to get a divorce is either to change their denomination or to change their religion. In such cases the provisions of Islamic shari’a [Islamic law] shall be applied and the couple will get a divorce. Such divorce will remain as civil divorce and will not be recognized by the church because it is against the Christian law.
The Clerical Council does not give permission to remarry except in cases of adultery or conversion to another religion [editor: in case of a change to another denomination one cannot remarry in the denomination one has left]. The Council permits the aggrieved party to remarry and forbid the culpable party from remarring. There are thousands of such cases remaining stranded between the civil divorce and the church law that does not recognize it.
The only solution to this crisis is to approve the unified Personal Status Law for all Christian denominations, which the bill thereof had been presented to the Ministry of Justice several years ago. The Minister of Justice said in a recently held religious celebration that the ministry is studying the draft law at the moment in order to refer it to the People’s Assembly. The bill consists of five chapters and contains 146 articles. It discusses all the conditions and impediments of engagement, marriage and divorce in addition to the rules of raising children. With respect to divorce, the Catholic Church kept special conditions for itself that agrees with its beliefs.
"I think we need a new Personal Status Law," said Revd. Wadi’a Lotf-Allah Yaqoub pastor of the Evangelical Church in Dairout. "New reasons for divorce may be added such as when a husband or a wife is sentenced to long term of imprisonment, madness, mistreatment, impotence or any other reason that may cancel any of the bases of marriage. There is a very important Christian and moral rule that says, ’law should be a servant of e man and not man servant of law.’ In other words, the law should serve, help and make man happy and man should not be a slave to the law."
"At the time being there is no Personal Status Law for Copts because the church does not implement the provisions of the law of 1938," said Father Marcos Aziz pastor of the Hanging Church. "The new Personal Status Law for Copts must come into effect because it observes the texts of the Bible. The Bible states very clearly that there should be no divorce except for the case of adultery while the law of 1938 gave more reasons for divorce that contradicts with the Bible such as abandon and mistreatment."
