Religion: The Desert Revival

I went to the monastery with a great fear. I wondered how I could fill this heart of mine in the desert, alone, because I am a man fond of human social contact.

I enjoyed the company of women, of my sisters and family. I love music and used to attend concerts in Alexandria almost every week. How could my heart be filled in lonely isolation? But God kept his promise to me. When I retreated to the desert, God gave me mountains of celestial sympathy. Instead of symphony concerts, I heard celestial music.

—Matthew the Poor

The words could almost have been written by some early Christian hermit, forsaking the pleasures of the city for the austere spiritual life of the desert. Instead, they are the thoughts of a 20th century monk, Malta el Meskin (Matthew the Poor), who is at the forefront of a remarkable renaissance of monasticism in the Coptic Church of Egypt.

The Copts, who number at least 10% of Egypt’s population, are akin to Eastern Orthodox Christians in liturgy and doctrine. As in other Eastern churches, monks play an important role, since only they can become bishops. While the number of monks in Western religious communities has declined by the hundreds during the past decade, the nine ancient Coptic monasteries of Egypt, almost deserted a few years ago, are now filled to overflowing. Though Egypt is identified with Islam, no place could be more appropriate for a monastic renaissance. It was in Egypt that monasticism first flowered, nurtured by the formidable example of the great 4th century anchorite, St. Anthony of the Desert. At the height of the movement, before the 7th century Arab invasions, Egypt boasted some 50,000 monks.

The current monastic revival—part of a general spiritual resurgence among Copts—has generated a broad enthusiasm among lay people. Coptic university students spend holidays in retreats at the monasteries. Some organize themselves into “families” attached to specific monasteries that they periodically join for prayer and work. Even after they leave the university, some young professionals choose the monastic life. The 50 monks of the monastery of St. Makarios, for example, include six physicians, five pharmacists and twelve engineers.

Slave of Christ. Much of the initial inspiration for the revival seems to have come from a mysterious ascetic who appeared in the Nile Valley in 1935, spent 30 years in a remote sandstone cave and vanished on a pilgrimage to Jerusalem in 1965. A wiry, wispy-bearded man known only as Abdel Messieh (Slave of Christ) the Ethiopian, he had a deep influence on two men who later became Patriarchs of Alexandria—Popes of the Coptic Church.

One was Mina el Muttawahad (Mina the Hermit), who spent years in the desert, then ruled the church until 1971 as Pope Kyrillos VI. He reformed the monasteries through renewed austerity and discipline. The second was Kyrillos’ successor, Antonius as Suriani, who currently heads the church as Pope Shenouda lII. Before becoming a monk, Pope Shenouda was once a lay teacher in the Coptic Sunday school movement, another church development that inspired renewed interest in monasticism. Even now Pope Shenouda retires each week to a mud-stuccoed hut in the des ert for a day or more of meditation and prayer.

Abdel Messieh’s greatest influence may have been on Matta el Meskin, a charismatic figure revered as a living saint by Copts (TIME, Dec. 29). Like the archetypal anchorite St. Anthony, Matta heeded Jesus’ call to “go, sell what you possess and give to the poor … and come, follow me.” Besides his cherished friends and family, Matta gave up his businesses (two prosperous pharmacies), two houses and two cars when he retreated to the desert 28 years ago. Later, called back from the wilderness to serve as a patriarchal vicar in Alexandria, he gathered a following, and in 1956 left for the desert again, with twelve disciples. A scholar who has written some 40 books on theology and church affairs, Matta is now engaged in a more practical task—rebuilding and expanding the monastery of St. Makarios.

Coptic monasticism today is a mix of the hermit’s solitude with a communal life, the blend depending on the individual. Combining prayer and study with farm and household chores, the monks sometimes take on ambitious tasks like the pilot land reclamation project in the desert southwest of Cairo.

Next week, marking their Eastertide by the Julian calendar, the Coptic Christians of Egypt will observe Holy Week. Easter is the Copts’ most solemn religious feast, and the devout prepare for it with a rigorous, entirely meatless 40-day fast. The monks follow an even more austere, 55-day regimen, and the monastery gates are closed to visitors for the entire period. As for Matta el Meskin, he has been spending Lent alone, out in the desert, back in the cave where God first “filled his heart.”