Our Lady of Cairo

**Our Lady of Cairo** was a mass Marian apparition that was reported to have occurred in the Cairo, Egypt.

## Apparition

### 2 April, 1968

The first apparition of the Virgin Mary at Zeitoun was recorded on the evening of 2 April 1968. The phenomenon was seen by two Muslim bus mechanics, who claimed to witness a woman dressed in white on the roof of Saint Mary's Coptic Church. One thought she was a nun about to attempt suicide by leaping from the roof, and called for police. Intrigued by the mechanics yelling "don't jump!", a crowd gathered at the site. The police attempted to disperse them, saying that the sighting was just a reflection of the light from the street lamps. However, a church custodian suggested the figure was the Virgin Mary, which greatly excited the crowd. The event itself ended after a few minutes.

One week later, on 9 April, the phenomenon reoccurred, again lasting for only a few minutes. After that time apparitions became more frequent, sometimes two or three times a week, for several years, ending in 1971. According to Coptic tradition, Zeitoun is near one of the locations where the Holy Family stayed during their flight into Egypt.

The patriarch of the Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria, Pope Kyrillos VI appointed a committee of high-ranking priests and bishops to investigate the matter, directed by Bishop Gregorios, bishop of postgraduate studies, Coptic culture and scientific research.

On 4 May Pope Kyrillos VI issued an official statement confirming the apparitions. Soon afterward, the Ministry of Tourism also issued a validation of the sightings, and began printing pamphlets.

Nuns of the Society of the Sacred Heart also witnessed the apparitions and sent a detailed report to the Vatican, resulting in the arrival of an envoy on 28 April who also saw the apparitions and sent a report to Pope Paul VI. As the apparition appeared over a Coptic church, the Vatican left the investigation to the Coptic authorities.

The apparitions were also allegedly witnessed by President Gamal Abdel Nasser, and images photographed by newspaper photographers and Egyptian television. Investigations performed by the police could find no apparent explanation. No device was found within a radius of fifteen miles capable of projecting the image, and many photos were taken of the alleged apparition by independent photographers. With no alternative explanation and approval from religious and political official, the Egyptian government accepted the apparitions as true.

### 11 December, 2009

The first person who saw the alleged apparition of Mary was reportedly an Egyptian Muslim neighbour, who was sitting at his coffee shop nearby, when he apparently saw a strong light coming from the Coptic Christian place of worship. He and others are said to have observed the light condense into a female form.

Mary supposedly appeared above the middle dome of the church. The reported apparition is then said to have moved between the domes and on to the top of the church gate between its two twin towers in front of the central church building. Many local residents reported seeing the alleged apparition of Mary.

A representative of the Coptic Orthodox Church of Alexandria has approved the apparitions. Mary allegedly appeared in luminous robes, in a pure white dress and a royal blue belt, with a crown on her head. Critics have pointed out that this colour pattern somewhat matched the colour pattern of the lights on top of and inside the tower behind the church's domes, i.e. a golden illuminated cross on top of the tower and blueish-white and yellowish-white electric light sources inside the tower.

Cell phones were used to call friends, take pictures and make videos of the phenomenon and send them to friends.

Critics have suggested that the overexposed and blurry quality of the pictures and footage being sent around on cell phones, facilitated the illusory perception of a figure, when in fact some people were looking at what were low-quality images of the illuminated church tower behind the domes.

Critics have suggested that the alleged apparition is actually the tower behind the church's domes with bright lights inside and on top of it, seen from different angles.

The claim that the "apparition" moved is not substantiated by any of the film footage, which never shows any actual movement, only three apparently different locations. One film shows an elongated light above the middle dome, which critics say is the back tower seen from an angle that aligns it with the aforementioned middle dome. Another film shows the same elongated light to the right of the middle dome of the church, which critics say is the same illuminated tower seen from an angle that puts it between the middle dome and the dome to its right. A third film shows the same elongated light apparently standing on top of the entrance gate, but this can be argued to be the same back tower observed from standing almost right in front of the entrance gate. The fact that the "apparition" appears smaller in this third film is consistent with this interpretation.

In response to the claim that the authorities turned off the electricity to the area to rule out a hoax or fraud, critics have said that one explanation is that other power sources, such as generators, could have been used to power a bright light in the tower of church.

However, investigations undertaken by the Egyptian government at the time showed that no such electrical equipment was found to cause such a phenomenon. The Egyptian government, which some have accused of turning a blind eye to the persecution of Christians in the Middle East, did not identify this phenomenon as being fabricated by the Coptic Church.