{"id":32643,"date":"2015-02-28T10:37:22","date_gmt":"2015-02-28T10:37:22","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/malankaraorthodox.tv\/?p=32643"},"modified":"2015-02-28T10:37:22","modified_gmt":"2015-02-28T10:37:22","slug":"coptic-church-recognizes-martyrdom-of-21-coptic-christians","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/malankaraorthodox.tv\/?p=32643","title":{"rendered":"Coptic Church Recognizes Martyrdom of 21 Coptic Christians"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a href=\"http:\/\/malankaraorthodox.tv\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/martyrs.jpg\"><img decoding=\"async\" class=\"alignnone size-medium wp-image-32644\" src=\"http:\/\/malankaraorthodox.tv\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/martyrs-300x225.jpg\" alt=\"martyrs\" width=\"300\" height=\"225\" srcset=\"http:\/\/malankaraorthodox.tv\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/martyrs-300x225.jpg 300w, http:\/\/malankaraorthodox.tv\/wp-content\/uploads\/2015\/02\/martyrs.jpg 575w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 300px) 100vw, 300px\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>The Coptic Orthodox Church has announced that the murder of the 21 Egyptian Christians killed by the so-called Islamic State in Libya will be commemorated in its Church calendar.<\/p>\n<p>Pope Tawadros II announced that the names of the martyrs will be inserted into the Coptic Synaxarium, the Oriental Church\u2019s equivalent to the Roman Martyrology. This procedure is also equivalent to canonization in the Latin Church.<\/p>\n<p>Listen to Junno Arocho&#8217;s report:<\/p>\n<p><audio id=\"audioItem_3258550\" class=\"video-js vjs-default-skin vjs-big-play-button-centered\" preload=\"none\" controls=\"controls\"><\/audio><\/p>\n<p>According to terrasanta.net, the martyrdom of the 21 Christians will be commemorated on the 8th Amshir of the Coptic calendar, or February 15th of the Gregorian calendar. The commemoration falls on the feast day of the Presentation of Jesus at the Temple.<\/p>\n<p>Militants of the Islamic State released a gruesome video entitled \u201cA Message Signed in Blood to the Nation of the Cross\u201d in which they released a warning saying they were \u201csouth of Rome.\u201d They then proceeded to behead the Christian men, some of whom were seen mouthing the words \u201cLord Jesus Christ\u201d moments before their death.<\/p>\n<p>While the killings have stirred fears of the Islamic State\u2019s close proximity to Europe, they have also strengthened many in their faith.<\/p>\n<p>In an interview with Christian channel SAT-7 ARABIC on Wednesday, Beshir Kamel, brother of two of the Coptic martyrs, even thanked the Islamic State for including their declaration of faith in the videos before killing them.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cISIS gave us more than we asked when they didn\u2019t edit out the part where they declared their faith and called upon Jesus Christ. ISIS helped us strengthen our faith,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n<p>Beshir said that he was proud of his brothers Bishoy and Samuel, saying that their martyrdom was \u201ca badge of honor to Christianity.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>Kamel\u2019s interview with SAT 7-ARABIC went viral, receiving over 100,000 views within hours of its posting online. When asked what his reaction would be if he saw an Islamic State militant, Kamel recalled his mother\u2019s response.<\/p>\n<p>&#8220;My mother, an uneducated woman in her sixties, said she would ask [him] to enter her house and ask God to open his eyes because he was the reason her son entered the kingdom of heaven,\u201d Beshir said.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Coptic Orthodox Church has announced that the murder of the 21 Egyptian Christians killed by the so-called Islamic State in Libya will be commemorated in its Church calendar. Pope &hellip; <\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":32644,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-32643","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-world-church-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/malankaraorthodox.tv\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32643","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/malankaraorthodox.tv\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/malankaraorthodox.tv\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/malankaraorthodox.tv\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/malankaraorthodox.tv\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=32643"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/malankaraorthodox.tv\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32643\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32645,"href":"http:\/\/malankaraorthodox.tv\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32643\/revisions\/32645"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/malankaraorthodox.tv\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/32644"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/malankaraorthodox.tv\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=32643"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/malankaraorthodox.tv\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=32643"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/malankaraorthodox.tv\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=32643"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}