Christianity Today, Week of September 9

Darkness at Jesus' Tomb
A fight breaks out on the roof of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.
By Ted Olsen | posted 09/12/2002


"The history of the Holy Places is one long litany of bitter animosities
and contentions," a British official wrote of Jerusalem in 1929. Those
animosities again broke out in violence in late July. While headlines
told of the latest violence between Palestinians and Israelis, Ethiopian
and Coptic Christians came to blows when one of the Copts moved his
chair on the roof of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, which
commemorates Jesus' resurrection. "Each sect has specific rights to
specific areas of the church, and should those rights be violated by the
other sects, tensions mount, and tempers flare," explains Doug Dicks, a
Jerusalem-based Presbyterian mission worker and member of Evangelicals
for Middle East Understanding. The Copt claims the Ethiopians "poked him
and brought some women who came behind him and pinched him." At least 11
monks—seven Ethiopians and four Copts—were hospitalized. "They are
trying to force us out," an Ethiopian monk explained to Reuters. "They
want to kill us. What have we done that God is punishing us like this?"

Copyright © 2002 Christianity Today



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