Coptic News Network Brief

Adel Ayman Akram Agaiby, a servant in St. Marina & St. Anthony Coptic Orthodox church’s bookstore, was brutally beaten by what can be described by shocked yet bemused eyewitnesses as extremely irate and belligerent old ladies. The assault occurred after a normal Wednesday liturgy, when the terrorizing tetas descended upon the bookstore. Adel states that typically the bookstore is only open on the weekends but since he he had a day off decided to go in to get caught up on some inventory. Since he was there and the women wanted something from the bookstore, he decided to help them. The women came looking for Pope Tawadros II memorabilia to build their personal shrines to him like they did for the thrice blessed late Pope Shenouda. When Adel replied all he had were a few copies of the official photo of His holiness, what was a group of kindly old ladies turned in to cantakerous hellions.

They started to jab and poke him with their fingers and canes accusing him of disloyalty to the church. How could he not stock a wide array memoribilia with His holiness’ face on it. They were wanted such things which they had with Pope Shenouda’s face like key chains, mugs, t-shirts, sun visors, stickers, baseball caps, commemorative plates, medallions, candles, candlesticks, kerchiefs, glass cubes and lampshades among other knick-knacks. Adel at this point – in what could be described as the turning point where things crossed the line into tragedy – stated that such things were in poor taste and really did not honor the man.

At this point the pugnacious grannies started to swing their canes in earnest, while others started to pray to God that He strike Adel dead and punish him eternally for this and not hold his sin of disrespect against the patriarch against the church, while a few others cursed him as only a grandmother can with baldness, infertility, failure at all he touched, dwarfism and other things that no one thought could possibly come out of the mouths of sweet old ladies. Adel suffered several contusions, a concussion, and broken ribs since he could not defend himself since he felt it was dishonorable to raise his hands against elderly women. The beating stopped when the person giving the old ladies a ride home was leaving. Though the worst part Adel stated was seeing his grandmother take part in the assault.

The Blessed Theotokos St. Mary on the eve of the feast of her dormition appeared in the church of St. George & St. Paphnutius. The miraculous apparition occurred at the revival (nahda) services – that common in the Coptic church during the period of St. Mary’s Fast – during the performance of of the various choirs in the church. At first doves of light were seen in the church which then flocked togeher over the chorus area in front of the altar. There they then coalesced together and then ever-virgin St. Mary appeared. All the while the choir was singing. Suddenly in a move that has never occurred in her apparitions in the history of our church, she spoke aloud. She said, “Stop”. The choir paused briefly but when she did not say anything else started to sing again. She then spoke again, “No, seriously stop singing.” She then disappeared in a flock of doves of light and a cloud of incense. The dumbstruck choir then went back to their seats and no other choir sang that night.

One Mr. Mohsen Youssef Adly, with tears of joy streaming down his face, exclaimed that now he can depart in peace as Simeon the elder, for God has answered his prayers and brought an end to the signing of the choirs. Choirs that caused the angels to weep and not in a good way. Later he told his friends that these choirs were God-awful and they just kept going year after year just because every parent wanted to see their kids up there and to justify the church expenditure for a Casio keyboard. It was torture. He also doubt the theological soundness of some of the songs they shrieked. When one of the priests of the church were asked their opinion of the matter, confidentially mentioned he wouldn’t mind if she apppeared to a few of the deacons as well.

Apparently this past Saturday for a few hours while His Holiness was in transit to Egypt there were rumors flying about that he had passed away. The confusion arose when someone missed the fact that the word departed more often means “To travel from or leave a location” than to “pass on from this world”. Sad but true.

Coptic News Brief
Local congregant, Mina M. Mina, unaware of how the Coptic leap shifted the date of the Feasts of the Theophany, was rather upset when he found out his mother did not make the traditional ‘ol’ass (colcassia) today on the 19th of January. When he inquired of his mother, with whom he still lives with despite being 45 years old, she told him the feast day was tomorrow. Mina thought his mother was making an excuse not to cook the dish and desired to see him wake up without a head*. Despite the fact that Mina went to church for services the night before and found it locked. He assumed that for security reasons they finished church early. It took his mother showing him each of the dozen church calendars they recieve in the mail to convince him the feast is tomorrow.

* For the unaware there is an Egyptian saying “He who does not ‘ol’ass on the Theophany will wake up with out a head” (it rhymes in Egyptian Arabic)

A local area who wishes to remain anonymous, to protect him from his father of confession, confides to the Coptic News Network that a week into the Advent fast and he has yet to start fasting due to the sheer amount of leftover food from Thanksgiving. This year was unusual in that Thanksgiving Day fell before the start to fast so this man’s family decided to go all out in cooking for it. Not that they did not make turkey and other non-fasting foods during the other years, just in deference to fact they should be fasting they just made less of it. But because of this this man, who claims he desires to fast, feels bad throwing away enough food to feed a small village. He feels that wasting all that food would be the greater sin. So when asked how much longer does he have before he can fast, stated that at his current rate of eating he should be ready in time for Lent.

When the Coptic News Network asked an area priest his opinion on this stated simply that that man should be thankful he does not know who he is and that he is not that man’s father of confession.