Right to remarry

The marriage of convenience between the Coptic Church and rights activists is on the rocks, writes Gamal Nkrumah. And still there is no divorce in sight
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Defied by an increasing number of disgruntled Copts and human rights organisations in Egypt and abroad and derided by what many of its adherents now openly dismiss as anachronistic views, the Coptic Orthodox Church is under pressure to adopt a more liberal approach to its role as guardian of Egypt's Christian heritage.

Human rights groups believe the time is ripe for change. What is more, the state -- or at least the judiciary -- has increasingly been willing to intervene. On 1 March the Supreme Administrative Court ruled that Pope Shenouda III, head of the Coptic Orthodox Church, must allow Copts who had obtained a divorce from family courts to remarry. It was a development guaranteed to stoke controversy, and it reignited this week with incidents of violence against Copts in different parts of the country. While the attacks might have prompted some Copts to retrench traditional positions, advocates of change have argued that the emphasis on countering extreme Islamist views has come at the expense of reassessing the ecclesiastical tenets of the Coptic Church which, rights activists say, are not beyond reproach.

"The problem with clerics is that they have an idealised concept of marriage. The leaders of the Coptic Church know nothing about the pitfalls of married life," Coptic novelist and columnist Mageed Tobia told Al-Ahram Weekly.

Tobia, an open critic of Pope Shenouda III, harbours strong views on the subject. "Do they understand how hellish it is to be in a failed marriage? I myself am a bachelor but I have friends who cannot stand the sight of their wives. I feel for the predicaments facing the husband, wife and children in such hellish situations and divorce is the only intelligent and logical way out."

Tobia concedes that it is too early to write off the Coptic Church, even in these turbulent and changing times. But the imposition of further restrictions by the church on the rights of Copts to divorce and marry, he says, would be incompatible with full citizenship and universal human rights. "It is against human nature. It defies reason and logic."

The church's dogged determination over a millennium, while it cannot be brushed aside as an anachronism, now sees it pitted against a growing band of reformers. The church, says rights activists, must now jettison its position on divorce and remarriage and bring its position more in line with concepts of civil marriage.

The Egyptian Initiative for Personal Rights (EIPR) has taken the lead in advocating the right of Copts to divorce and remarry and last week called on the Egyptian authorities to take immediate steps towards establishing an optional family law system.

"State officials have no right to wash their hands of the problems, needs and suffering of thousands of Coptic citizens who are demanding no more than their basic right to marry and create a family," argues Hossam Bahgat, director of the EIPR.

"The Coptic Orthodox Church is entitled to its interpretation of religious texts, but the state has the right -- indeed, the duty-- to provide an alternative to those Copts who disagree with the interpretation."

EIPR says that Coptic Church leaders have refused so far to comply with the court ruling, yet under Article 23 (b) of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, ratified by Egypt in 1982, it is the Egyptian state that is ultimately responsible for protecting the right of men and women of legal age to marry and found a family.

"The Supreme Constitutional Court found in 1995 that the right to marry falls 'within the realms of privacy protected by Article 45 of the constitution which states that citizens' private lives are protected by law,'" Bahgat points out.

The church's monopoly of ecclesiastical matters cannot be allowed to hinder the full citizenship rights of Copts, which includes their right to a civil marriage, or remarriage, as opposed to a church one, explains Bahgat, noting that this has traditionally not been an option since the church will only sanction religious marriages. "At the moment church-sanctioned remarriage is out of the question. An increasing number of Coptic Christians are converting to Islam and other Christian denominations where marriage annulments can be obtained more easily."

Coptic journalist and activist Karima Kamal, author of the controversial Coptic Divorce, concurs. "The church has its own opinion on the subject. And, for reasons that I can well understand, the vast majority of Copts believe that the church's position on the subject has been sanctified since the earliest beginnings of the spread of Christianity in Egypt 2,000 years ago. Most Copts still believe that their disagreement with the church on this or any other subject is tantamount to a betrayal of their faith."

Kamal stresses that in the past Coptic laypersons had greater say in the running of the affairs of their church. The Consultative Assembly of Lay Copts (the Melli Majlis ), for example, permitted prominent members of the Coptic community to participate in Coptic Church affairs, including the promulgation of ecclesiastical laws. The Coptic Orthodox personal status regulations, issued by the Melli Council in 1938, stipulate that there are reasons that might lead to divorce. She laments that today Copts are increasingly forced to toe the church line for fear of being ostracised. "It is only in cases where individual Copts suffer the trials and tribulations of a difficult marriage that they openly oppose the church," she says.

Current sectarian tensions, she argues, have resulted in a charged atmosphere that pushes Copts towards ever greater conservatism as a means of self-preservation. "Antagonising the church would mean letting the church down and undermining its authority at a time when Christians in Egypt need to stick together in the face of the rising tide of religiosity," says Kamal. "Both Muslims and Christians really need to accept a civil, secular state. We live in a religious state which has resulted in a dangerous, religious polarisation of society."

Kamal warns against the dire consequences of the "ghettoisation of Copts in contemporary Egypt".

"It would be a dangerous precedent. No segment of Egyptian society should feel alienated," she says, stressing that upholding shared citizenship rights accentuates a common feeling of belonging while emphasising differences can only exacerbate polarisation.

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