Egypt: Former monk charged with murder of Coptic Orthodox bishop + update

Bishop Epiphanius

Source: Fides

Prosecutors in Egypt have charged a former monk with the murder of Coptic Orthodox Bishop Epiphanius, who was found dead in a pool of blood on July 29th at the desert of Monastery of San Macro.

The 64-year-old scholar, served as the Abbot of the Monastery, which is around 100 kilometres outside the capital Cairo.

Police investigations concluded that the bishop had been struck with a sharp instrument; which had left him with fractures in the back of his skull.

Now prosecutors say Wael Saad, a former monk at the monastery - who was defrocked last week - confessed to using an iron bar to bludgeon the bishop; however, there is no known motive for the crime, but it is reported he was being investigated by the victim for violating some rules of monasticism.

Saad has now been charged and remains in custody, as investigations continue. The Coptic Orthodox Church has frozen the recruitment of new monks for the next 12 months, banned the use of social media, and instructed monks that leaving monastery grounds requires official permission.

Bishop Epiphanius - a disciple of Matta el Meskin - was an important figure in the modern Coptic Orthodox Church. A native of Tanta, he had a degree in medicine. He became a priest in 2002 after entering the Great Monastery of Saint Macarius in 1984. Abbot Epiphanius worked on translations, from Greek to Arabic, of several books of the Bible.

A researcher and scholar, he took part in the 10th international Conference on Coptic studies in Rome in 2012. One year later, he was elected Abbot by the 100 monks of the Monastery of Saint Macarius.

Coptic Christians make up an estimated 10 percent of the population in Egypt.

Fides 3 July 2020

The Supreme Court of Cassation of Egypt has confirmed a death sentence on Wael Saad Tawadros, a former monk found guilty of killing on 29 July 2018 at St. Macarius Monastery, in the Wadi Natrun region of northern Egypt. A second death sentence, issued last February on his alleged accomplice, was commuted to life imprisonment.

When the first sentence was issued, Anba Agathon, Coptic Orthodox Bishop of Maghagha. Bishop Agathon appealed for prayers for the two condemned men, describing it as a "catastrophe".

The assassination of Bishop Epiphanios, abbot at St. Macarius Monastery, represented a real trauma for the entire Coptic community and in particular for the monastic environments. According to what was reconstructed during the investigations, disputes arose between the murdered abbot and the two condemned for economic issues and for several violations of the monastic rules by the two monks (one of whom, Wael Saad Tawadros, after the murder had been stripped of the monastic habit at the end of a long canonical process).

During the trial, the two accused continued to proclaim themselves innocent, and also retracted previous confessions of guilt which, they say, would were extorted through psychological pressure from the investigating bodies.