Teenage Christian Twins to be treated as Muslims?
According to the November 2007 edition of Barnabas Aid, Christian twins, Andrew and Mario Medhat, are in danger of being effectively forced to convert to Islam. The boys’ father converted to Islam voluntarily some years ago and divorced their Christian mother, with whom the boys continued to live.
A court in Alexandria has now ruled that the 13-year-olds must live with their father and his new (Muslim) wife, which means that the authorities would treat them as if they were Muslims. According to one source, their father has already had the religion changed on their birth certificates to “Muslim” without his son’s consent. A final ruling on the case was due on September 3rd but the session was adjourned.
Andrew and Mario are staunch Christians. Having been forced to study Islamic religion at school because they were now considered Muslims, they both handed in exam answers on which they had written only the single sentence, “I am a Christian.”
The school initially refused to move them up to the next grade without a pass in Islamic religion, but Egypt’s Education Minister intervened on August 25th, after international and domestic pressure, to say that the boys would be able to move up.
One of the biggest problems facing Egyptian Christians from a Muslim background is that the authorities will never change their identity cards to show that they are now Christians. Yet it is quick and easy to change a Christian identity card into a Muslim identity card. Being legally considered a Muslim has severe implications for Christians, especially in marriage, inheritance and other family legal matters.
Egyptian Christians from a Muslim background remain in the same predicament about legal identity and facing the same kinds of harassment and persecution as before. Although Egyptian liberals have been asking for decades that religion be removed from official documents like ID cards, so as to prevent discrimination, nothing has changed. However, in the last few months, the issue has become one of public debate as a number of Christians have taken their cases to court.
REV THE HON. DR GORDON MOYES, A.C., M.L.C.
