As Copts celebrate the Holy Virgin during her 15-day fast that ends with the Feast of her Assumption on 16 Misra, 22 August, more than 1.5 million pilgrims flock to Assiut’s Western Mountain at Dronka—Assiut is some 350km south of Cairo—to visit a cavern believed to have hosted the Holy Family on their biblical flight to Egypt. Dronka celebrations are famous for being of legendary scale and spirituality.
Pilgrims head to Assiut during the Holy Virgin’s Fast to worship, celebrate, seek blessings and possibly miracles, and baptise their children. Assiut’s late Metropolitan Anba Mikhail who was seated in 1946 and passed away in 2014, and is seen by Copts as a modern-day Saint, built guest houses and churches to accommodate the growing number of visitors, and used to preside over the spiritual activities of the Holy Virgin’s Fast. The current Bishop of Assiut, Anba Yu’annis has followed in the Metropolitan’s footsteps and has kept the thriving tradition alive.
The Holy Virgin’s procession at Assiut Mountain is an unequalled one-of-a-kind event that draws the pilgrims time and again to the site. Scores of deacons in white robes and red sashes line up in a wide double row carrying crosses and chanting to cymbals and triangles in the procession leading the icon of the Holy Virgin, with Anb Yu’annis offering incense before the icon. The procession emerges from the cave that hosted the Holy Family and is now home to the icon and a small church, and marches along a path down the mountainside and up again. Pilgrims line that path waiting for the icon to pass by, and erupt in joyful ululations and cheers once it does. No one that ever witnessed it but that determines to be back again. The procession is incorporated in Vespers service, and is followed by a sermon. Every morning, Mass is celebrated.
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To cater for visitors, Anba Yu’annis has this year set subsidised prices for food and beverages. He said that the many families who travel for long distances to take part in the celebrations may find it difficult to meet the financial burden of the rising prices. “We desire that everyone should be celebrating with joy, without feeling overburdened,” he said. “The trip involves a lot of expenses including transport and food, and would be a huge load for the poorer families without whom no celebration can be complete. The Holy Virgin welcomes everyone with open arms.”
The subsidy earned raves on social media. One blogger wrote: “I was in a Dronka a few days ago. I couldn’t believe the lower-than-everywhere-else prices of food and drink! I even thought there was some mistake, but Tassoni (literally Sister) selling the goods assured me the prices were correct, they were subsidised by Assiut Diocese.
“I was very happy. It is a wonderful thing that all people and all families are able to buy basic needs at affordable prices.”
Watani International
20 August 2022