page_title: Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria
section_title: From the 19th century to the 1952 revolution
hierarchical_section_title: Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria / History / From the 19th century to the 1952 revolution
caption_attribution_description: Costumes and characters, etc. Coptic monks.
context_page_description: The Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria is an Oriental Orthodox Christian church based in Egypt, Africa and the Middle East. The head of the Church and the See of Alexandria is the Patriarch of Alexandria on the Holy See of Saint Mark, who also carries the title of Coptic Pope. The See of Alexandria is titular, and today the Coptic Pope presides from Saint Mark's Coptic Orthodox Cathedral in the Abbassia District in Cairo. The church follows the Alexandrian Rite for its liturgy, prayer and devotional patrimony. With approximately 10 million members worldwide, it is the country's largest Christian church.
  According to its tradition, the Coptic Church was established by Saint Mark, an apostle and evangelist, during the middle of the 1st century. Due to disputes concerning the nature of Christ, it split from the rest of Christendom after the Council of Chalcedon in AD 451, resulting in a rivalry with the Byzantine Orthodox Church.
context_section_description: The position of Copts began to improve early in the 19th century under the stability and tolerance of the Muhammad Ali Dynasty. The Coptic community ceased to be regarded by the state as an administrative unit. In 1855 the jizya tax was abolished by Sa'id Pasha. Shortly thereafter, the Copts started to serve in the Egyptian army.
  Towards the end of the 19th century, the Coptic Church underwent phases of new development. In 1853, Pope Cyril IV established the first modern Coptic schools, including the first Egyptian school for girls. He also founded a printing press, which was only the second national press in the country. The Pope established very friendly relations with other denominations, to the extent that when the Greek Patriarch in Egypt had to absent himself from the country for a long period of time, he left his Church under the guidance of the Coptic Patriarch.
  The Theological College of the School of Alexandria was reestablished in 1893. It began its new history with five students, one of whom was later to become its dean. Today it has campuses in Alexandria and Cairo, and in various dioceses throughout Egypt, as well as outside Egypt. It has campuses in New Jersey, Los Angeles, Sydney, Melbourne, and London, where potential clergymen and other qualified men and women study many subjects, including theology, church history, missionary studies, and the Coptic language.
caption: Coptic monks, between 1898 and 1914
exif: {"Image ImageWidth": "5993", "Image ImageLength": "4442", "Image BitsPerSample": "8", "Image Compression": "Uncompressed", "Image PhotometricInterpretation": "1", "Image Orientation": "Horizontal (normal)", "Image SamplesPerPixel": "1", "Image XResolution": "800", "Image YResolution": "800", "Image PlanarConfiguration": "1", "Image ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Image Software": "Adobe Photoshop CS3 Windows", "Image DateTime": "2010:05:04 23:52:39", "Image Artist": "Library of Congress", "Image ExifOffset": "280", "Thumbnail Compression": "JPEG (old-style)", "Thumbnail XResolution": "72", "Thumbnail YResolution": "72", "Thumbnail ResolutionUnit": "Pixels/Inch", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormat": "418", "Thumbnail JPEGInterchangeFormatLength": "6067", "EXIF ColorSpace": "Uncalibrated", "EXIF ExifImageWidth": "2447", "EXIF ExifImageLength": "1903"}