Brickbat: Freedom of Religion

The monks of St. Catherine's Monastery, a 1,600-year-old Greek Orthodox site in Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, closed its doors to visitors in protest after an Egyptian court ruled that the monastery's land belongs to the government. A UNESCO World Heritage Site and the world's oldest continuously inhabited Christian monastery, St. Catherine's faces uncertainty as the ruling strips the monks of property ownership, prompting fears of eviction or conversion into a museum. The decision sparked outrage among global Christian leaders, with the Greek Orthodox Church and Greece's foreign minister engaging in diplomatic talks with Egypt to protect the monastery's status. Egyptian officials, including President Abdel Fattah al-Sisi, insist the ruling preserves the monastery's spiritual value and ensures the monks' access, but the monks, led by 91-year-old Archbishop Damianos I, call it a de facto expulsion. Greek and Egyptian officials later announced the site would be safe but provided no further details.