The Coptic Orthodox Evangelism
Assignment 1
(Project for the Evangelism Class)
By
Victor Beshir
Dear Sisters & Brothers:
After covering different aspects of evangelism, in which we explored the history of evangelism, the development of evangelistic work over the centuries & its obstacles, some practical methods of evangelism, and others, now you have the basis that would help you in working on your first assignment for this class. The assignment is a challenging one, but it is very important for you and for others who would follow suits and get into evangelism.
So, What is the assignment?
The
assignment is about the Challenges we
face today as Coptic evangelists in the Western countries. These challenges have nothing to do with our
church in
You as the pioneers in Coptic evangelism in the Western atmosphere need to establish the basis and the norms in evangelism, some of which are challenges.
However, before starting, I’ d like to make it very clear that the following discussions are my own and express my own opinions and thoughts. This is not a theological or biblical topic, but it is rather a result of my own social, psychological, and historical insight of our Coptic culture, which may be different from others’ insight.
Here are some of the Challenges:
First:
Based on the
conclusion of the lesson: ‘Towards a Coptic Orthodox Theology of Mission,’ evangelism is not evangelism
of the Coptic Orthodox Church, but it is essentially evangelism of the Gospel
and the salvation of our Lord. However, the church acts as the presenter and
the gate to salvation, which is very fundamental in reaching it.
Then
the question is: how do we present the message of salvation to others?
Here is how different people present salvation:
1- Protestants:
Ask people to just believe in Christ to receive Him in their hearts, and the salvation is done instantly. There is no need for water baptism (in most of their churches) and there are no sacraments in most denominations (it happened as a reaction to the dreadful history of the Catholic Church in the middle ages, as I talked about in the lesson,’ Where is the church established by Christ & His disciples?’)
2- Coptic Orthodoxy:
Before we talk about how we present salvation in the Coptic Orthodox Church, we need to be aware of some sad historical facts that influenced our life for a long time.
First: Islam:
a-
Forcing Islam on
Copts:
The church lived under
the sword of Islam continuously for about thirteen long centuries. Islam did not spread in
b-
Economical
Pressure:
To
make more Copts accept Islam, many Muslim rulers made employment in government
and states are available for Muslims only.
In addition, a Copt could not work for a Muslim Company or a Muslim
person. All these along with the heavy
taxation on Copts made life very difficult, which led some Copts to accept
Islam in order to make a living.
c- Social Pressure:
You will be surprised if you read about the Social laws imposed on Copts to determine the way they dress, how they should walk or ride in the street, and the daily attacks and insults they received in their daily life.
d-
Attack on Christian Faith:
It became a Muslim habit to attack the Christian faith and to consider them as infidels.
e-
Evangelize
Muslims:
While Islam is forced on Copts; they prohibited by the law to preach or evangelize Christianity to a Muslims. To evangelize to a Muslim is a capital crime punishable by severe punishment. Both the Christian and the convert could face death, if not by the state, it applied by the Muslim public and their clerks.
What is the Impact of Islam on Coptic
Evangelism?
1- The impact was very severe. Copts had to forget evangelism. It was not easy for an evangelistic church like the Coptic Church to stop its great mission, as established by the Lord Himself (Matt 28: 20,20).
Copts have developed another understanding of evangelism that is evangelism is to evangelize to your family or your Coptic friends or the Coptic lost sheep.
One of the great challenges that we face in the Coptic Orthodox Church when we mention evangelism is dealing with the thought of ‘we should evangelize to Copts first.’
This obviously is not evangelism service. Serving other Christian Copts is the service that comes under “Pastoral Care” or “The lost sheep Service.” But, evangelism is calling people who are not Christians to accept the Christian salvation. Whenever, you hear Copts telling you to stop thinking about evangelizing to others, you need to remember that this is the natural result of thirteen long centuries under the Islamic sword.
Therefore, the first Challenge is How To Change The Perception of Evangelism in the Mind of the Copts.
3-
Against the horrors of Islam, the church had to
concentrate on the defensive side of the Christian faith, especially the
divinity of Christ and the Trinitarian faith.
This influenced our lectures and writings about Christianity. We hurry to talk about theology and to defend
the Christian faith. Evangelism needs a
more relaxing mood. Western People need life-changing experience more than they
need to see proofs of theology. Western People are thirsty for salvation,
more than they are interested in hearing theological arguments.
Therefore, Coptic Evangelism needs to go back to the core of salvation
and change the theological defense tone. Of course, you will need to talk about
theology, but not in your first approach.
We definitely need to teach people about the faith. But there is a difference between
catechetical teachings and evangelism approaches. Our approach to evangelism
starts with offering salvation to the troubled Western person of the
twenty-first century, and when he accepts the message of salvation, then the
catechetical teachings start. In other
words, the second challenge
is to go back to the simplicity of the gospel.
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Second:
Protestantism:
When Evangelical
Protestants came to
The Coptic Church found itself in a battle to defend her
faith and her liturgical life against the continuous waves of Protestant
attacks. Soon our books were filled with
defensive attitudes. It came
as a psychological reaction. It was
needed to stop the attack and to support the faithful against the hostile
attack by Protestants in
Here are some thoughts about our reaction to Protestants’
teachings in
1- As a reaction to the Protestant teachings on denying ‘the human works in salvation,’ we started to talk more and more extensively about the value of the human work. At the same time, as a reaction to the emphasis of the Protestants on ‘Faith,’ we talked less and less about faith. In evangelism, and away from any attack reaction, we need to consider how to proclaim salvation, as the Apostles proclaimed without neglecting the rule of faith or talking extensively about the human work. In other words, we need to study the topic to offer the Orthodox concept of faith and human works within salvation.
2-
Again as a reaction to the extensive talk
about ‘grace’ by the Protestants, we tended to talk less and less about the
work of the grace in salvation. It goes
unnoticed, not because of lacking realization of the great impact of the grace,
but rather due to psychological reasons.
In evangelism, we need to talk more and more
about the grace until it reaches its position in salvation, as taught by the
fathers of the church.
3-
When you are under
attack, it is natural to defend. This is
what happened to some of our writings about salvations and sacraments. The writers had the attack in the back of
their mind, therefore, some of these books we can
consider as ‘Apologetic books,’ which means books to defend the faith. However, when it
comes to evangelism, you don’t need ‘Apologetic works,’ but rather an
evangelistic approach. The
difference between the two is so great. The Western person needs the water that will quench his
thirst for salvation and in most cases he doesn’t care about the theological
debates.
4-
We need to start
evangelism by showing the treasures that are embodied in salvation, and explain
the great salvation as we enjoy it in our church’s heavenly worship and
sacraments.
5-
Since in
6-
Salvation in the
Orthodox Church comes through sacraments.
As a matter of fact, it is weaved into the church sacraments and
liturgical life. Again, in
The
Coptic Orthodox Church has the fullest meaning and practices of salvation. Its theologians and teachers know deeply and
accurately the position of salvation in the human being’s
life, and fully understand salvation’s elements in their partiality and
entirety.
So, we are not talking here about
starting from scratch, but to gather the rich and deep writings related to the
topics from the treasures of the fathers of the church, put them together, and
think about how to present them in effective evangelistic ways. Please don’t
forget that we are the inheritors of the richest and purest teaching of the
heavenly salvation that was handed down from the apostles, to the fathers, and
then to us, not only in written words, but also in a living liturgical life
that nourishes our salvation needs on a daily basis.
7-
Therefore, we
need writings and sermons that explain the rule of the daily, weekly, monthly,
and annual liturgical practices in our salvation.
8-
Until now, since we have no
evangelism in
9-
What
is mentioned about books applies also in writing brochures and booklets. There
is a big difference between brochures that have spiritual topics and
evangelistic brochures. Evangelistic brochures should be written with the reader’s
status and salvation in mind and their goals should be to attract people to the
faith.
10- Similarly, after giving a lecture about the Coptic Church, I’ d rather to see people attracted to join my church than to have them applaud my lecture and leave as they entered except with some info about the church. I’d rather put my efforts in my lecture not in mentioning the glories of the church that may not appeal to them, but mentioning what make joining the church very appealing to them, and to make the church very attractive to their souls so that they come forward after the lecture asking to join the church.
Second:
How To
Prepare People to Join the Church?
1- In the Apostolic era, people joined the faith almost immediately or after a few hours or days or weeks (Please review the book of Acts to see examples).
2-
The
3- The third century witnessed preparation for three years that ended up in a very intensive course before the initiations (baptism).
4- The fourth century fathers eliminated the three years and replaced it by five weeks of instructions mostly during the Lent. These instructions covered the scriptures, the Creed, the Lord’s prayers, and some sacramental introductory teaching.
Now, we need to select preparation that fits our time and suits the need of people in the Western atmosphere. And this will lead us to the important next point:
Understanding the American Person:
It is very essential to understand the people whom we are going to evangelize to. The Lord Jesus Christ’s teachings reflect a deep understanding of the Jewish people at His time and their everyday activities, needs, and concerns.
As we know, the American person
moves about eleven times during his life, to go to live in a different city or
state. When he moves, he shops for a
church. It
doesn’t matter that much for most any Americans what church he will ended up
attending, because he doesn’t know that much about theology or the differences
between denominations or even these differences don’t concern him at all. He will visit a few churches in his new area
and then decide which one he will attend based
on which one received him well, and has enough activities for his family. This is why the American churches have the marketing
mentality and the methods on how to fill the churches with a lot of
activities. They
say as a rule of thumb, if you have 100 families in your church, you have to
have at least 80 activities.
These facts and others about Americans should be considered when we
think about evangelism in the
Now,
here is the assignment that every member in the evangelism class needs to do:
Pick
up one of the following topics, pray, think about it, research it, and then
write an essay about it. You may join
others in study of a big topic like ‘Orthodox Concept of Salvation.’
1-
What is the
Orthodox concept of salvation in relation to faith, sacraments, work,
liturgical life, and grace? You need to
refer to the Apostles, and the fathers of the church.
2-
How to
present the concept of salvation in Orthodoxy in a simple yet powerful way to
others?
3-
How did the
Church evangelize to others in different periods? Pick up one period.
4-
How did the
church prepare others for baptism? Pick
up one period or one of the Fathers.
5-
How can we
understand the American person?
Based
on your topic, pick up from the following references:
1- The book of Acts.
2-
3-
The writings of the Apostolic Fathers
4-
The Ante-Nicene, Nicene & Post Nicene
Fathers
5-
The Catechetical and Mystamgogical
lectures of Saint Cyril of
6-
The Catechetical Homilies of Theodore of Mopsuestia.
7-
‘On the Mysteries’ by St. Ambrose.
8-
The Baptismal Catechese
of
9-
The Pilgrimage of Egeria
(If you know Arabic, refer to my book about Egeria)
10-
11- Treatises by Cyprian
12- Tertullian:
Treatise on Baptism.
Second:
Book about the Fathers & Evangelism:
1- Anne Field,
From Darkness to Light, How one became a Christian in
the early church, Concilliar Press.
Third:
Theology of
1-
Bishop Antonius Markos, An Introduction Into Theology of
2-
James Stamoolis,
Eastern Orthodox
Fourth:
Orthodox Evangelism in
1- Fr.
George Liacopulos, Lights of the Modern World:
Orthodox Christian Mission and Evangelism in the
2- Jordan Bajis, Common
Ground, An Introduction to Eastern Christianity for
the American Christian, Light & Life Publishing.
3- The
Orthodox Church in
4- Reverend Constantine Nasr,
The Resource Book for Orthodox Evangelism, Theosis
Publishing
Fifth:
Books About Orthodoxy & Coptic Orthodox:
1- Fr. Tadros Malaty, Introduction to the Coptic Orthodox Church
2-
Bishop Kallistos Ware, The Orthodox Church
Sixth:
Books about converting to Orthodoxy and converts:
1-
Frederica Mathews Green, At the Corner of East
and Now, and also her book: ‘Facing East: A pilgrim’s Journey into the
Mysteries of Orthodoxy
2-
Fr. Peter
Gillquist, A Journey To Orthodoxy, Concilliar Press
3-
Fr. Peter
Gillquist, Coming Home, Why Protestant Clergy are Becoming Orthodox? Concilliar
Press.
4-
Fr. Peter
Gillquist, Bringing
5-
Virginia Nieuwsma, Our
Hearts’ True Home, Fourteen warm, inspiring stories of women discovering the
ancient Christian Faith, Concilliar Press.
6-
Thomas Doulis, Journey
to Orthodoxy, A collections of Essays by Converts to Orthodox Christianity,
Light & Life Publishing
7-
Franklin Billerbeck,
Anglican - Orthodox Pilgrimage, Concilliar Press
To get in touch with the Concilliar Press, use the following web page:
http://www.christianity.com/conciliarpress
To get in touch with Life and Light Publications, please visit the following:
Let us pray,
read, search, and write. Please let
me know what project you will be working on, so others can choose other
topics. Dead line to send your assignment is