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8/7/11

Parishioners’ Straight Talk and Prayers for Qaddafi in Libya - by David D. Kirkpatrick

For this week’s sermon at the Libyan capital’s main Protestant church, the Rev. Hamdy Daoud chose to talk about the trial of Hosni Mubarak.

“You have seen the strong man judged in a bed in Egypt,” he told the two dozen immigrant members of his congregation who braved the city’s checkpoints to make it to Anglican Mass on Friday. “And so it works that the weak can overthrow the strong,” he added. “This is what is happening in our Middle East.”

In a city of tapped phone lines and ubiquitous government informers, the weekly Mass at the Church of Christ the King is a rare sanctuary: a place to speak freely with a group of Tripoli residents about the anxious, ever-shifting mood of the city.

Asked about his sermon, Father Daoud, an Egyptian trained in Britain, offered his own views. “Christ is shaking the Middle East,” he said. “Christ is fighting for freedom and justice and democracy. The church is calling for justice, but Christ is using Muslims as well to bring his justice.”
“For the leader of this nation, Muammar Qaddafi, and for the leaders of all nations,” he said in closing his sermon, “let us pray.”

For more: Parishioners’ Straight Talk and Prayers for Qaddafi in Libya - NYTimes.com

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