As a Coptic man myself, I feel confident in saying: Coptic men, we have a problem. Too many of us feel entitled. Entitled to feel comfortable in our white-passing privilege. Entitled to women’s bodies. Entitled in our false sense of security because we view ourselves as being good deacons or Sunday School servants.
But what is the definition of a good deacon or Sunday School servant? Is it enough to just lead liturgy? What does it show our youth when we are very clearly jostling for the mic to lead a hymn? What does it portray when we lead tasbeha one week and then demean women the next?
Too many of us are quick to use our tongues to praise God on Sundays and then use that same tongue to belittle the plights of women and African Americans. Two recent examples immediately come to mind that inspired me to write this blog post.
Firstly, the killing of George Floyd and the Black Lives Matter movement: For too many of us, there seems to be a complete lack of understanding of systemic racism. Too many of us care more about property damage than Black lives. Many of us seem to believe that the Black people we see murdered on camera must have done something to deserve it. Too many of us seem to be unable to fathom the history of the United States, how ingrained racism is, and how it continually manifests itself in subconscious and subtle ways.
I used to think that it was our parents’ generation—the one that immigrated to the Western world from Egypt—who only had this issue, but unfortunately, far too many of my contemporaries who were either born in the West, as I was, or who moved here at a very young age, also share these ignorant and dangerous views. Why are they dangerous? Because they perpetuate our nonchalant, and therefore complicit, attitudes and manifest themselves as unwelcoming and suspicious facial expressions when a Black person enters one of our churches. It is the furthest thing from the Church’s teachings we have learned and the same ones we claim to be teaching to our Sunday School students.
Too many of us seem to think that if something doesn’t personally affect us, then we need not care. Last time that I checked, this mindset is absolutely contrary to the teachings of Jesus.
Secondly, the reports around sexual assault and rape that have been percolating among Coptic youth on social media: While the alleged acts themselves are horrendous and unconscionable, what may be even more disturbing is the reactions other Coptic men have had. I have seen some men say that the women are as equally as guilty as the rapist. I have seen other men come to the defense of women just now to gain clout, when a very quick glance through their past tweets clearly shows a pattern of ingrained and vile sexism that is presented as merely “jokes”.
Clearly, our Church labeling these topics as “taboo” is not conducive to having the necessary discussions that need to be had. The Church must take a more proactive stance and speak out against this toxic mindset that has corrupted our collective youth and has been passed down to us from the Arab culture our Church has developed in. I see many Coptic men speaking out against these instances of sexual assault and rape, and I see many Coptic youth siding with the Black Lives Matter movement. But it is not enough for only a handful of people to speak out.
As a Coptic man, it is incumbent upon us men to believe women when they come out and speak on these things. It is incumbent upon our Church leadership to take an unequivocal stance on these issues. Such moral issues cannot be politicized. Our Coptic Church does not need to be politicized any more than it already is.
Topics such as racism, sexism, celibacy, and sex need to be talked about more openly and without reservation. I feel like that for far too long, leadership has pretended that these are not issues that all of us youth, particularly in the West, must deal with daily. The consequences of this illusion are that so many Coptic men do not know how to act around women and our Coptic women have learned to bear the brunt of these injustices in silence. It has now become more imperative than ever for Coptic men—deacons, servants, priests, leadership—to take a stand and support our Black brothers and sisters, and our sisters in general: Coptic, non-Coptic, Black, or any other race.
Sam Fouad is a communications professional and journalist based in Washington, DC. He can be reached on Twitter at @_saf155.
Anonymous
7 Jul 2020In Defense of the Things I Love
I read an article entitled “An Open Letter to Coptic Men,” by Sam Fouad in a publication named Coptic Voice. Because Mr. Fouad has written publicly, I will address him in kind. In short, I would offer that having a voice is not the same as having a good voice, and Mr. Fouad’s voice is so off-key that he no longer ought to sing to us.
Mr. Fouad climbs to the highest pulpit to lecture the Church about its deficiencies. Two observations strike me about this article, neither worthy of praise.
First, Mr. Fouad’s article lacks critical thinking. He cannot understand that one can simultaneously oppose both racial discrimination and the Black Lives Matter movement—or even that the Church must actively oppose both. Mr. Fouad is either malicious or ignorant of the fact that the BLM movement is openly Marxist and anti-religious, and that it calls for the disruption of “Western-prescribed nuclear family structure” and the freeing of “heteronormative thinking.” The Church will sing in praise of every man, but it will not chant demonic songs. It will affirm that our black brothers and sisters are made in the image and likeness of God, but it will not affirm that the Church will be made in the image and likeness of Mr. Fouad. In the spirit of charity, I choose to believe that Mr. Fouad is ignorant on these matters especially in view of his absent-minded advice that “our Coptic Church does not need to be politicized any more than it already is.”
Next, Mr. Fouad dresses himself as a champion of women. However, I would remind our bathroom singer to first take the plank out of his eye so he can clearly remove the speck in his brother’s eye, and to see if he truly is without sin, before he casts the first stone. Before condemning the deacons, the Sunday School servants, the commentators, and the leadership of the Church, Mr. Fouad would do well to remember that pride, not lust, caused the fall. Rather than work quietly within his community to ensure that young people do not fall into the snares of the devil, Mr. Fouad would prefer to imply that the Church is full of adulterers, enablers and blind guides.
However, the problem with Mr. Fouad is not that he is Mr. Fouad, but that he is a modern man, and the modern man does not understand how to love, because he has only learned how to criticize. The modern man cannot love his Church, and he cannot love his country, and he cannot love a woman. In all three, he sees only the imperfections. And while he wishes to love her, he waits to do so until she is made perfect. Worse, in all three he is quick to publicly speak of her shortcomings and never of her virtues.
As the English author wrote, “Men did not love Rome because she was great. She was great because they had loved her.” So, it is with our marriages, and our churches, and our countries. One can only change a thing if he loves the thing. To change anything with hatred, or even with indifference is to destroy it so that it ceases to be. A mother loves her child, and reforms the child with her love. She does not form the child into something she can love. She loves the misbehaved child, the dirty child, the ill child. The artist and the surgeon can both draw the dashes and alter the canvas, and the potter can shape the clay, but the modern man does not have the dexterity nor the grace to do any of this. His stone hands cannot draw, they cannot heal, they cannot shape—they can only pummel, and they can only destroy. His softest touch bludgeons.
Many marriages have failed because men and women do not understand this simple truism. Churches and marriages and countries are not changed from the outside with open letters and thoughtless critiques. They are changed from the inside with gentleness, love, prayer and a soft and humble voice.
The trouble with the modern man is not just that he does not know how to think—there are idiots who have found bliss. No, the trouble with the modern man is that he does not know how to love. And when he has criticized every institution, every country, and every person, and hurled insult upon insult, and accused all of God’s creation of every sin and wallowed in his misanthropy, he will find himself alone.
— Tom Williams (shared here by Anonymous Penguin)