Cairo, Egypt, May 5, 2011 / 08:02 am
The Coptic Christians of Egypt have announced a march of one million people to protect the Cathedral of San Marco from the protests of a Muslim group.
One Catholic missionary in the country is cautioning against seeing the action as a move toward inter-religious conflict.
Several Coptic movements have announced a May 6 protest march to protect the cathedral in the Cairo suburb of Abbasseya. On April 29 thousands of Salafi Muslims staged a sit-in protest in front of the cathedral to seek the “release” of Kamilia Shehata, the wife of a Coptic priest who they claim converted to Islam and is now allegedly being held captive and pressured to return to Coptic Christianity.
“We must be careful not to give hasty judgments. We must wait until the situation evolves, without excluding any possibility of development,” Fr. Luciano Verdoscia told Fides news agency.