The file of the conference about reform in the church is still
open.
There are still many reactions to the conference and its recommendations.
Hānī
Labīb, a
coordinator of the conference, wrote about the ‘backstage’ [Reviewer: theater image used
metaphorically for behind
the curtains]of the first conference of reform in the church after that of 1911.
He expressed that the organizers
agreed on certain principles to be the final convention of the conference.
These principles are supposed to
guarantee the independence of the new secular current and the objectivity
of the dialogue.
Labīb
referred to the conference by “the meeting,” claiming that it was not
against Pope Shenouda or any of the figures
of the Coptic Orthodox Church as some had tried to circulate.
The meeting was subject to many accusations, the
biggest of which was the accusation that it was similar to
a Lutheran separation.
Moreover,
Hānī Labīb expressed the organizers’
disapproval on the attendance of Max Michel’s
informational consultant who was not invited, asserting that
the organizers of the meeting did not allow
participants who represented private programs like Jamāl
As‘ad’s, George Ishaq, Rafīq
Habīb and others.
Al-
Usbū‘ of November 27 published a letter sent by a monk
who did not mention his name.
The letter is addressed to the pope and the organizers of the conference, and
indicates that the church is
going through a dangerous phase. In the letter entitled, ‘We are before a Theological
Catastrophe,’ the
monk mentioned that the reform movement started during the 1940’s and 50’s during the days of
Pope
Yousāb II, when Pope Shenouda was a revolutionary Coptic youth who aimed at changing the reality of the
church at that time. The Pope, says the unknown monk, seems to have changed his reform opinions.
Dr.
Rafīq Habīb expressed that the conference made more noise than it deserved, denoting that the
public
followed Pope Shenouda and that the problem laid in the new bishops for they have characters
different from the
Pope’s. In spite of his restrictedness, Pope Shenouda occasionally enjoys a great deal
of
flexibility.
Rose al-Yūsuf of November 26 mentioned that the editor-in-chief of a
newspaper
related to the Coptic Orthodox Church [Reviewer: Title not mentioned] described the organizers of
the conference
and its participants as a gang of excommunicated people.
To that, Kamāl
Zākhir, one of the two
coordinators of the conference, asserted that the conference was intended to
be more a meeting than a real
conference. Zākhir was astonished by the attack of some Orthodox
figures, and expressed that the ultimate
goal of the conference was to discuss the problems of the church:
“We intended to put the church in its real
Biblical and Patriarchal meaning before its serious
responsibility, without intending to judge anyone,”
Zākhir expressed.
Organizers of the
conference asked to communicate with Pope Shenouda via the SMS
after they failed to reach him through his
secretary. The only answer they received was that of Bishop Marqus,
Bishop of Shubrā and the
official spokesman of the Coptic Orthodox Church who told them that appointments
are made through the
Pope’s secretary.
Bishop Marqus said on belalf of Pope Shenouda and clergy in an
interview to
Watanī Newspaper that the Coptic Orthodox Church does not require any reform. They
further
claimed that the requests of the conference were already applied in the church, and that the laws that rule
the ordination of the patriarch can be decided upon only by the Holy Synod. Bishop Marqus asserted that the
church
was not whole without laymen, and that there is no other law in the church other than the law of
love.
