WATANI International
11 July 2011
Last Sunday saw a church in Dar al-Salam, in Sohag, Upper Egypt catch fire, together with seven neighbouring Muslim-owned houses.
Father Wissa Azmy of Mar-Mina’s said the fire erupted because of an explosion of a small portable cooker in a Muslim-owned house adjacent to the church and that there was no criminal or sectarian suspicion related to it. Since the house, the church and all the neighbourhood homes are built of mud bricks and reeds, with wooden ceilings, the fire quickly spread was completely burned, and some of its walls collapsed because of the power of the water pumped out of fire extinguishers. It took the townspeople a long time to put out the fire, since water was scarce and no fire brigade was near. Fortunately, no there were casualties.
Fr Azmy expressed his anger at a police detective who sent a tirade of abuse against the church, as if giving the green light for sectarian sedition, even though the town’s Muslims and Copts have a history of living in harmony. Fr Azmy filed an official report against this detective, whose name he preferred not to divulge.
A group of the town’s Islamic fundamentalists are resisting the rebuilding of the burnt-down church, Fr Azmy told Watani, but moderates are endorsing a call to rebuild the church which has been serving the congregation for 15 years. Fr Azmy appealed to the authorities to for permission to rebuild the fallen walls before 12 July which marks the Feast of the Apostles.