Since the Second World War churches have made tremendous efforts to strive towards more unity. At the same time, we see national and church politics often getting in the way. In this example about church division from Egypt, it is not about dogmatic differences but about the long-term effects of (inter)national politics. UK politicians in 1956 where hardly interested in the consequences of the UK entering in a war against Egypt for the ministry of the church. No one then could foresee that even decades after the war had taken place and Anglican nationals had been expelled from Egypt that denominations would fight each other in court for property and independence from each other.

On October 24, 2020, Anglican Archbishop Dr. Mouneer Hanna Anis [Munīr Ḥannā Anīs] called for an extra-ordinary church council to discuss a draft petition of the Anglican or Episcopal Church of Egypt to President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi [ʿAbd al-Fattāḥ al-Sīsī] with the request to give the Anglican Church of Egypt a status that would be independent from any of the current three Church Councils that regulate relations between church and government. These three are the Orthodox Church Council, the Catholic Church Council and the Protestant Church Council. Representatives from all Anglican parishes throughout Egypt were invited to attend.

The Diocese of Egypt with North Africa and the Horn of Africa, founded in 1839, has been a member church of the Protestant Council of Egypt (PCE) since 1980. The PCE is dominated by the Presbyterian Church of Egypt since they are the largest Protestant Church in Egypt. Egypt’s Supreme Court ruled in 1995 that the PCE is spiritually and administratively responsible for all its constituent denominations. Anglican resistance came with the consecration of Bishop Munīr in 2000 who was, prior to his consecration as priest in 1999 a medical doctor in the Anglican Harpur Memorial Hospital in Menouf [Minūf], a city in the Egyptian Delta. Bishop Munīr was very familiar with the problems resulting from the government confiscating in 1980 the Anglican school in Minūf. This confiscation made the then bishop Ishaq Musaad [Isḥāq Musʿad] join the Protestant Council of Egypt (PCE) to regain the school in which he succeeded. A Supreme Court decision in 1995 strengthened the position of the PCE over individual member churches. This was not to the liking of the Anglicans and Bishop Munīr tried to regain independence from the PCE but could not come to an agreement with the then head of the PCE, Dr. Safwat al-Bayadi [Ṣafwat al-Bayāḍī], about returning to the status of before 1980. Bishop Munīr brought the case in 2002 in court and lost the court case in 2016. It is unusual for churches to sue each other in court and it has greatly spoiled the relations between the Anglican Church and the Presbyterian Church in Egypt.

The verdict has reduced the ability of the diocese to deal with various government institutions, including obtaining permits for buildings and visa for clergy. Bishop Munīr, in turn strengthened his position in the worldwide Anglican Communion through the formation of the Anglican Province of Alexandria on June 29, 2020 which made him the Archbishop of the Province. The executive board of the Anglican Diocese of Egypt, one of the four dioceses forming the Anglican Province, suggested a memorandum of understanding regarding cooperation in ministry with the PCE instead of being under their administration. The PCE said this was not possible. This has made the Diocese organize an extraordinary meeting with all its congregations and ministries on October 24, 2020, and accept the text for a letter to the President requesting independence from the PCE and thus the ability to deal directly with government institutions without interference of the PCE.

This text is based on information presented by Archbishop Dr. Munīr Ḥannā Anīs and an informed Egyptian member of the Anglican Church and Anglican priest who prefer to remain anonymous. It is hard to obtain supporting documents and many people prefer not to comment at all because the tensions between the Anglican Diocese and the PCE are deemed to be so sensitive. This draft text has been seen by Archbishop Munīr and I have accepted some changes he suggested but he declined responding to specific questions for more details. I have written this report to the best of my understanding of these tensions and remain entirely responsible for the content in this report.