Attacks over the past week on Christian churches and schools in Egypt has drawn worldwide attention to the longtime tension that has existed between the nation's minority Christians and its Muslim population.
The current violence stems from a belief by extremist Islamic groups that Christians backed the July overthrow of President Mohamed Morsi. To help put Egypt's religious population in perspective, The Pew Research Center has broken down the numbers of Christians living as minorities in Muslim countries. In addition to being a minority group in Egypt, Coptic Christians are also among the first Christians in the world, starting with their first church in Alexandria.
In addition, USA Today has created an interactive map with real-time updates on attacks on Christian institutions in Egypt.
Explore Pope Francis’ apostolic exhortation on the family with our free study guide.
NCR Comment code: (Comments can be found below)
Before you can post a comment, you must verify your email address at Disqus.com/verify.
Comments from unverified email addresses will be deleted.
We are not able to monitor every comment that comes through. If you see something objectionable, please click the "Report abuse" button. Once a comment has been flagged, an NCR staff member will investigate.
For more detailed guidelines, visit our User Guidelines page.
For help on how to post a comment, visit our reference page.
Commenting is available during business hours, Central time, USA. Commenting is not available in the evenings, over weekends and on holidays. More details are available here. Comments are open on NCR's Facebook page.