Coptic Orthodox Church Confirms Ecumenical Dialogue Suspended Due to Rome’s ‘Change of Position’ on Homosexuality
VATICAN CITY — The Coptic Orthodox Church has confirmed that its decision last week to suspend dialogue with the Catholic Church was due to Rome’s “change of position” on homosexuality.
In a video released on Friday, Coptic Orthodox spokesman Father Moussa Ibrahim said “the most notable” of nine decrees emanating from the church’s annual Holy Synod which took place last week in Wadi El-Natrun in Egypt was “to suspend theological dialogue with the Catholic Church after its change of position on the issue of homosexuality.”
The video message followed the conclusion of the Holy Synod the day before and an accompanying statement in which Coptic Orthodox leaders had said they were suspending dialogue with Rome.
“After consulting with the sister churches of the Eastern Orthodox family,” they wrote, “it was decided to suspend the theological dialogue with the Catholic Church, reevaluate the results achieved by the dialogue from its beginning twenty years ago, and establish new standards and mechanisms for the dialogue to proceed in the future.”
The leaders also reaffirmed their rejection of same-sex relations, stating their “firm position of rejecting all forms of homosexual relationships, because they violate the Holy Bible and the law by which God created man as male and female, and the Church considers any blessing of such relations, whatever its type, to be a blessing for sin, and this is unacceptable.”
The Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria, headed by Pope Tawadros II, is one of the world’s oldest Christian denominations whose founding dates back to St. Mark the Apostle. The principal Christian church in Egypt (the word “Copt” is derived from the Greek word Aigyptos, meaning Egypt), the precise number of its members is unknown but estimated to be between 10 and 20 million people out of a total Orthodox population of 260 million.
Although it describes itself as Orthodox, it is not in full communion with Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew and Eastern Orthodoxy, but remains united with the Ethiopian, Armenian, Eritrean, Malankara and Syriac Orthodox churches, collectively known as the Oriental Orthodox churches. None of these churches accept the Council of Chalcedon in 451 and its definition of the “two natures” of Christ. Since the late 20th century, the Oriental Orthodox churches have sought to dialogue with Rome and Eastern Orthodoxy which for centuries had considered them heretical.
