WATANI International
11 October 2011
Now at the age of 17, the twins Andrew and Mario Ramsis who have been making the headlines since 2007 for the prolonged legal battles they went through to gain their right to remain Christian, have finally been handed their ID cards with “Christian” cited as their religion.
The twin’s father, Medhat Ramsis had converted to Islam and, in 2007, had their birth certificates changed to cite their religion as Muslim. According to Egyptian law, a Muslim parent possesses the right of passing his religion on to his children even if they were born into another religion. The twins discovered they were being considered Muslim by the State when, as they sat for their mandatory examination in religion, they found out they had to be examined in the Islamic, not their original Christian, religion. They both refused to answer the exam questions, and each handed in the answer sheet with only one sentence written: “I am Christian”.
Their Christian mother Kamilia Lutfy, who was already divorced from their father, took their case to court, and the Education Minister issued an exceptional decision that the twins should be promoted to the higher class, even though they had officially failed their religion examinations, until the court passed a ruling in their case.
The mother and twins who were both altar boys in church and who insisted they wished to remain Christian, went through several legal battles until they were finally able to attain that right.
A month ago, a court ruling was issued stipulating the right of individuals born into a non-Muslim religion but who converted to Islam at any point in their lives, whether through a personal decision or through being the children of convert parents, to return to their original religion. The ruling, however, does not apply to persons born into Islam but wish to convert. In Islam, a person who gives up his or her religion is considered a deserter, meaning an apostate who, as such, deserves the death sentence.