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The vast majority of Egyptian Christians are Copts who belong to the Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria, an Oriental Orthodox Church. [2] [3] As of 2019, Copts in Egypt make up approximately 10 percent of the nation's population, [4] with an estimated population of 9.5 million (figure cited in the Wall Street Journal, 2017) [5] or 10 million (figure cited in the Associated Press, 2019). [6]
Many Coptic intellectuals hold to Pharaonism, which states that Coptic culture is largely derived from pre-Christian, Pharaonic Egyptian culture. It gives the Copts a claim to a deep heritage in Egyptian history and culture.
An Egyptian court on February 25, 2016, convicted four Coptic Christian teenagers for contempt of Islam, after they appeared in a video mocking Muslim prayers. [53] Nearly all Egyptian Christians today are Copts, adherents of either the Coptic Orthodox Church or other Coptic churches.
However, gradual conversions to Islam over the centuries had changed Egypt from a Christian to a largely Muslim country by the end of the 12th century. [38] Another scholar writes that a combination of "repression of Coptic revolts", Arab-Muslim immigration, and Coptic conversion to Islam resulted in the demographic decline of the Copts. [39]
Coptic Cross on a column in the Temple of Philae Coptic liturgical inscription from Upper Egypt, dated to the fifth or sixth century Saint Mina is the most popular Coptic martyr in Egypt In the fourth and fifth centuries AD, the foundations were laid for the divergence in doctrine between the native Christian Church of the Egyptians, and that ...
The "Coptic period" is an informal designation for Late Roman Egypt (3rd−4th centuries) and Byzantine Egypt (4th−7th centuries).This era was defined by the religious shifts in Egyptian culture to Coptic Christianity from ancient Egyptian religion, until the Muslim conquest of Egypt in the 7th century.
Despite the persecution under al-Hakim's reign, Egypt remained mainly Christian, but Coptic Christianity lost its majority status after the 14th century. [32] At the end of the Fatimid dynasty, Salah al-Din renewed discriminatory laws against non-Muslims, but there was little or no active persecution until the Mamluks came to power. [33]
The Coptic Church believes in the importance of remembering and celebrating such acts of “willful death” in order to preserve and continue both Egyptian and Christian identities. [26] Common phrases spoken at protests, such as the Maspero demonstrations , are “With our spirits, our blood, we will redeem the cross” showcase the ...