Priests of Alexandria issued a statement signed by 156 priests, including several expatriate priests, expressing their unanimous rejection of a diocesan bishop nomination for the Coptic Orthodox patriarch or the Diocese of Alexandria. Archpriest Roweiss Marqus, General Deputy of the patriarchate in Alexandria, sent a letter to Bishop Pachomius, Coptic Orthodox acting Patriarch, supporting the statement and stressing his disapproval for a diocesan bishop to be nominated for the position.

The statement referred to an article written by the late Coptic Orthodox Pope Shenouda III, when he was the editor in chief of the Sunday School magazine, in which he wrote that the whole Church is against the nomination of a diocesan bishop for the pope.

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