Egyptian Copts test pilgrim ban to Jerusalem
Egypt's Coptic Orthodox Church has maintained a ban on Copts visiting holy sites in Israel and Palestine since 1978, but some are debating its merit.
CAIRO — Inside a stuffy office just off Tahrir Square, hotel manager Nemr Lotfy, a Coptic Christian, remembers his pilgrimage to Jerusalem.
"It was always one of my greatest hopes to go inside the tomb of Jesus Christ," he smiles, talking at length about the Garden of Gethsemane, the Old City and the Holy Sepulchre. "It was always a dream for me, to live it — not just to see it." To do that, Lotfy had to disobey a decades-old church order banning Copts from visiting Jerusalem. "I want to go again and again, but we must respect the order of our pope."
