Holy Family route, opened in Egypt
Egypt, Culture, 6/3/2000

Egypt's Prime Minister Atef Ebeid attended on Thursday opening of the "Holy Family Route" celebrations held under the Bible-inspired title of "Blessed be My People of Egypt". A musical ceremony was held in front of Virgin Mary Church which overlooks the Nile in Maadi district.

The spot is one of the places visited by infant Jesus Christ, his Mother Virgin Mary and Joseph the Carpenter.

Attending the ceremony were Parliamentary Speaker Ahmad Fathi Srour, Grand Imam of Al-Azhar Sheikh Mohammad Sayed Tantawi, Pope Shenouda III and a cohort of senior officials, intelligentsia and media personalities in addition to a number of leaders of the world's major churches.

The ceremony crowns the conclusion of the first phase in the revival of the route which coincides with the anniversary of advent of the Holy Family to Egypt on June 1, 2000 years ago.

The Society for Revival of National Heritage which groups a number of leading Muslim and Coptic businessmen has contributed to financing the project under the supervision of the Ministry of Tourism.

Minister of Tourism Mamdouh al-Beltagi addressed the ceremony expounding that Egypt, the birthplace of monotheism, is weaving all its people into one cultural and national tissue. The celebration is a genuine Egyptian story about how the Egyptian people embraced the Holy Family who came here seeking safe haven and peace.

Al-Beltagi said the celebrations represented " a deep- rooted history of unification between Muslims and Christians". " This is the first stage of a project to show how Egypt, the cradle of civilization, welcomed the Holy family", Al-Beltagi added.

"The verified script of the story is sung and choreographed to the tunes and illustrated documentation of visual art," said Beltagi.

"The locality is inspiring per se and the place is reminiscent of the holy memory where in 1976 a Bible was found floating on the water off the Church and was open on a page where the verse read "Blessed be My people of Egypt," added Beltagi.

The ceremony kicked off with a hymn chanted by the choir. It featured eleven presentations illustrating the story of the escape of the Holy Family from the persecution of the despot Herod, then Roman King of Palestine, to Egypt on inspiration from the Lord.

The show evokes the sites to which Virgin Mary, Jesus Christ and Joseph the Carpenter resorted on their flight starting from Farma, north of Sinai, to Deir Al-Muharraq in Assiut and their return. The family stay in Egypt lasted for four years minus one month.

Meanwhile, Prime Minister Atef Ebeid on Thursday gave the go-ahead for a project to maintain the Virgin Mary Tree in Cairo's district of Matareya.

At a ceremony on the occasion, Ebeid gave directives that the shrine be made a tourist magnet through infusing the site with the aroma of history associated with the Holy Family during their refuge in Egypt.

Attending was Nadia Makram Ebeid, Minister of State for Environment Affairs, who said her ministry, in tandem with the Ministry of tourism, will make a contribution of L.E. five million to the National Heritage Revival Society in charge of the project.

Munir Ghabbour, the society chairman, said the refurbished site walls would feature inscribed verses from the Qoran and Bible and a museum housing pictures of the stops the Holy family had made as they trekked in Egypt.

Previous Stories:
  Ebeid inaugurates Virgin Mary's Tree development project   (6/1/2000)
  Virgin Mary Church in Maadi overlooking River Nile   (5/31/2000)
  Egyptian message to world at Holy Family's Journey Anniversary   (5/9/2000)

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