| In 1945, Egypt became a Diocese on its own. Bishop Gwynne was 82. He retired the following year and was succeeded by Geoffrey Allen. He appreciated the need to strengthen the indigenous church and set about making the structural changes necessary for this to happen. He established a new constitution, bringing the councils of the expatriot and Egyptian parts of the church together for the first time with equal representation. But events were to move too quickly. The nationalist aspirations of the Egyptian people, held in check by the wartime occupation, once again asserted themselves. The failure of Anglo-Egyptian negotiations led in 1951 to the abrogation by the Egyptian government of the 1936 Treaty. British troops in the Canal Zone responded to Egyptian guerrilla attacks by besieging the Egyptian police headquarters in Ismailia. Fifty Egyptian policemen were killed. The next day, known as ‘Black Saturday’, riots in Cairo led to the burning hundreds of buildings, many of them associated with the British presence, including the Shepheards Hotel and the Turf Club where a number of Britons perished. The unpopular King Farouk used the disorder as a pretext to remove Nahas from the premiership. This further weakened the king’s grasp on power and on 26th July 1952, the Free Officers led by Gamal Abdel Nasser seized power and forced him to abdicate. Bishop Allen left Egypt soon afterwards to become principal of a theological college in England. He realised that the role of Bishop in Egypt required a knowledge of Arabic which he lacked. He was succeeded by Francis Johnston who had served in Egypt for 36 years. It was his task to lead the church in a context very different from the one that had existed when he had arrived in Egypt. In 1954, Britain agreed to withdraw its troops from the canal but to maintain the base there with British civilians. Once again the agreement provided for reoccupation in the event of war. In July 1956, Britain and the United States withdrew their offer to finance the Aswan High Dam Project. Nasser immediately nationalised the Suez Canal. Britain and France persuaded Israel to invade the Sinai, supposedly giving them a pretext to protect the Canal. This abortive effort led eventually to the expulsion of all British personnel from Egypt. The Episcopal Church was left in the hands of four Egyptian clergy under Archdeacon Adeeb Shammas. Many of the institutions of the Diocese were seized by the government and the Church was left weak and isolated. Bishop Frank Johnston resigned in exile in Britain in 1958 after medical reports indicated that it would be inadvisable for him to serve overseas again. Episcopal oversight for the Church in Egypt passed to the Bishop in Jerusalem, Campbell MacInnes, recently made Archbishop in the newly created Province of the Middle East. Properties were returned in 1959 and in1960 the Revd Donald Blackburn was invited to become Provost of All Saints’ Cathedral and the Revd Douglas Butcher returned as Chaplain in Alexandria. A number of missionaries followed. Kenneth Cragg, the distinguished Islamist and Arabic scholar, came to Egypt as Assistant Bishop to George Appleton who succeeded Campbell MacInnes as Archbishop in 1968. Bishop Cragg was based in Cairo until 1974 when Ishaq Musaad was consecrated as the first Egyptian Bishop in Egypt. Emigration and restrictions on evangelism have meant that the Diocese has remained numerically small but geographically it covers a huge area. The revived Diocese included the Chaplaincies of Ethiopia, Somalia, Libya, Tunisia and Algeria, necessitating travel over vast distances by its bishop. The Diocese also continues to play an important role out of all proportion to its size, providing a bridge between the Evangelical churches and the ancient Orthodox Churches, especially the Coptic Church. Since 1963, plans had been afoot to construct a new bridge across the Nile from the site of All Saints’ Cathedral. These were revived in 1970 and the demolition of the building followed. The Egyptian Government donated land on the opposite side of the river on Zamalek Island behind the Marriott Hotel. A new residential block was built and services were transferred to a new Cathedral Hall. The foundation stone for the new Cathedral was laid by Bishop Ishaq in 1977 but it was to be a further eleven years before the building was completed and consecrated on St Mark’s day, 25th April, 1988. Bishop Ishaq had retired in 1981 and been succeeded by Bishop Ghais Abdel Malik who was consecrated on 14th May 1984. Other properties confiscated by the government have gradually been returned or compensation paid, enabling the Church to resume the traditions of service laid down by the early missionaries. In recent years, this has extended to welcoming many of the Sudanese refugees who have fled the civil war in southern Sudan to Cairo where they receive help through the Joint Relief Ministry. The Harpur Memorial Hospital in Menouf has grown and flourished under the leadership of its Medical Director, Dr Mouneer Hana Anis. He was consecrated Bishop of the Diocese in May 2000 following the retirement of Bishop Ghais. Under his episcopacy, the Diocese once again faces questions about its identity and purpose and new challenges as it seeks to witness to the love of Christ in Egypt and throughout North Africa. Matthew Rhodes May 2001 Source: Nile Harvest: The Anglican Church in Egypt and the Sudan by Brian de Saram, Bournemouth: Bourne Press Ltd, 1992. |