• Origins
  Although Farahat was now Father Simaan, and ordained as priest of the church of St Simaan, he had few pretensions as to his education and training. On the contrary, he liked to emphasize that he came from a down-to-earth fellaheen or 'ploughman's' family, who lived in a tiny village.
  The day Farahat was born there was a triple celebration. In the same family, there was a double wedding - and a new birth. In the traditional Egyptian countryside, the arrival of a baby boy is a very special occasion. (More so than if the baby is a girl, despite a long government campaign to convince people that 'a girl is like a boy'!) This boy was born on the same day (5 December 1941) that two uncles got married. So they called him 'Farahat', which means 'weddings'. Later he liked to think of his name as 'the Wedding to come', when Christ comes to take his bride, the Church.
  The village where Farahat was born (which rejoices in the name of Meet Ayesh Kafr Yusuf Meet Ghamr Daqhaleya!) is near AI-Mansurah in the densely populated Nile Delta. Al-Mansurah is a provincial capital, situated on a broad sweep of a fast-flowing middle channel of the Delta. The furthest point reached by the Crusaders on several separate occasions, by 1941 it was under British administration. Surrounded by a richly fertile countryside, it was a fairly prosperous place to live, given the wartime conditions. But in terms of customs and traditions, the few kilometers that separated the city from the countryside represented a vast cultural gulf.
• City and Country
  Even today, city and countryside differ a great deal. In the city, numerous multinational companies like Macdonald's and Kentucky Fried Chicken clash incongruously with the history and rural position of the city, yet many indigenous shops are more glitzy. City-bred girls wear smart, somewhat westernized clothes and go out in the evenings to the cinema and other such entertainments.
  But even Egyptian city-dwellers would regard the opportunities of women and the free mixing between the sexes that is the norm in the Western world as excessive. They expect their daughters to go out in groups, often of the same sex, and to be home by a certain time. They don't allow 'dating' and a girl must not go out alone with a man until after a legal engagement ceremony that is just as public as a wedding. Their marriage is more a matter of two families getting together than two individuals. But in the city the young couple has their say in whom they marry and enjoy a certain measure of freedom. During the engagement they will get to know each other's personalities and lifestyles, and if they don't get on they can call the engagement off.
  In the countryside in 1941, by contrast, it was still usual for people to get married because the elders of their village had decreed it in their childhood. Neither bride nor groom had any say in the matter: the word of the elders was enough. This traditional system could result in men and women leading somewhat separate lives even after marriage, and having rigidly defined roles. Even then there were tensions, and the frictions between the Couple could be exacerbated because they had not chosen each other in the first place.
  Gradually, a greater measure of choice came into being to the point where today a man from the village could eve' choose to marry a girl from the city. However, if he does do this, culture-shock often results, as the girl frets at finding her freedom restricted, and being told she cannot go to this place or do certain things. She may long to go shopping a she used to, but the family may insist on sending someone t~ go for her. She may be frustrated by her new family and shock them by using make-up or dressing in Western fashions she may even demand to go to places where men outside the family will see her - something that is not acceptable in the countryside.
• Childhood and Youth
  Far hat’s father, Abraham, was a fellah (country farmer). He would have been as conservative as the next man in the village, but he was also a committed Coptic Christian and along with his wife, Mary am, built up a Christian fami1; life. Therefore one place he did allow Far hat’s mother to go was the local church of the Virgin Mary. Far hat was the youngest of her six children and she always took him to church with her. When he was only six years old she took him to see the bishop of the diocese of Daqhaleya who agreed to ordain Farahat as a shamaas (deacon). I~ theory, the minimum age for becoming a deacon was twenty five, but the rule was simply not observed. In the early days of the Egyptian Church the deacon would have performed similar duties to an Anglican deacon today, but now their main role was to chant parts of the service, usually in groups. The archdeacon was a kind of master of ceremonies for the service. So in effect Farahat was joining the choir - he was not going to preach at the age of six!
  Maryam always made sure Farahat went to Sunday school, and this had a very big influence on him. He especially remembers a khaadim (lay-worker) coming from Cairo to speak to them. The story this man told moved Farahat to tears. We don't know what he said, but a typical example of the kind of testimonies circulating in Sunday schools about that time is that of Lilian Trasher. Lilian came to Egypt without any resources or any plan save that she had a deep conviction that God had led her there, and would show her what her ministry was to be. It turned out to be looking after orphans in the countryside of Upper Egypt - and there were many instances when she was forced to rely completely on God to provide for them. On one occasion she had run out of food, but she told the orphans that Jesus would provide for their needs. She had no idea how.
  The time for the meal arrived and in faith she got all the orphans to sit down in front of their empty plates. They said grace in the usual way. She assured them Jesus would provide, and there came a knock on the door. A van had run out of petrol outside. These were the war years of the 1940s when fuel was rationed, and there was no way the van was going to complete the journey before the food inside it went off. The owner offered the food to Lilian and the orphans had far more to eat than they normally would!
  Hearing of God acting in real life changed Farahat's whole outlook. It wasn't long before his friends noticed this, and were eager to listen to his ideas. Even though at
  This stage he had no first-hand experience of God acting in his life, there was plenty of opportunity for the influence of Sunday school to take root in Far hat - for it wasn't until he was eleven that he was sent to a government-run school.
• Reckoning with God
  It was after this change of school that peer-group pressure started to come into play in a big way. More and more Far hat found himself following his new friends and began to drift away from his Christian beliefs and lifestyle. By the age of sixteen he had drifted away from the Church Completely, and just when it seemed that he was crashing out of the Christian life completely, God caught him. One day he was in his room studying when a voice from nowhere demanded, 'what’s this latest sin you've committed? Where you're heading is hell.'
  'What's all this about sin and hell?' protested Far hat. 'I'm far better behaved and more moral than most people of my age.'
  But then suddenly he saw himself in a picture projected on to the wall in front of him. It was as if God was running a complete cine-film of his life. 'These are all the things you have done, from when you first knew sin up to this moment,' said the voice within.
  Despite his protestations, Far hat already felt weighed down by sin, and at times it really frightened him. If anyone mentioned death, or if he heard of someone dying, he couldn't sleep a wink for several nights running. So when the voice said, 'what’s this latest sin you've Committed? Where you're heading is hell,' despair overwhelmed him. Casting around for any means of support, he grabbed hold of a book in front of him. It belonged to his sister, and he'd never even opened it before. The title was prayers of the Saints.
  The first thing he read really hit him between the eyes. People, it said, 'are heartless and cruel and never do right' (Psalms 14.1). 'No one is acceptable to God!' (Romans 3.10) was the verdict. We are 'less than a puff of air' (Psalms 62.9). The confession 'I have sinned and done wrong since the day I was born' (Psalms 51.5) seemed to Farahat to sum up the 'cine-film' of his life. The complaint 'something in me keeps me from doing what I know is right' (Romans 7.21b) reminded him of all his past struggles with sin. 'What a miserable person I am' (Romans 7.24) was a fair summary of how he felt.
  After that, the tone of the verses in the book changed. 'But to all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God' (John 1.12 RSV). Instead of despair, there was hope: 'everyone that the Father has given me will come to me, and I won't turn any of them away' (John 6.37). Christ could make him clean: 'the blood of his Son Jesus washes all our sins away' (1 John 1. 7b).
  Suddenly Farahat sensed just how much he'd sinned, saw that the love of Christ could reach him, but felt powerless to do anything about it. He'd no idea how to turn his understanding of the words into effective prayer. But turning to the next page he found just the words that he needed.
  It said, 'Lord, I have burdened you and cheated you by my evil deeds. I was the one who moved away from you. You know all my secrets and all my life, but I am coming to you now. Forgive me, give me a new heart and purify me with your blood. "Create in me a dean heart, 0 God, and put a new and right spirit within me" (Psalms 51.10 RSV).
  I make a covenant by your grace that I will not backslide again, since your power is in your weakness and I am very weak.'
  When Farahat had finished praying he felt a great weight lift from his shoulders. For the first time ever, he picked up the Bible and read it not because it was a deacon's duty, but because he really wanted to know what was in it. Amazingly, it fell open in John's Gospel at the same verse that he'd read in Prayers of the Saints: 'To all who received him, who believed in his name, he gave power to become children of God' (John 1.12 RSV). This confirmed to Farahat that God had really spoken to him, that he had now received God into his inmost being, and begun a new life with him.
  About midnight he fell asleep and dreamt he was wearing a white galibeyya (a long tunic). It looked very smart but there was a black spot over his heart. He heard a voice say, 'Why are you wearing that? The black mark looks very bad.'
  The dream continued with a hawker in the street outside calling out that he was carrying white paint. Farahat thought he would go down and buy the paint and use it to get rid of the black mark. So he opened up the door of the room (which was part of a very big house) and went out He then saw a man in white who looked wonderful. With him was a lady, who was also wearing white. As he got nearer to the man, he realized he was radiating a pure and almost blinding beauty. Farahat found that the sheer force of this beauty kept him from approaching the man. But the man said to Farahat, 'Come, my son, what is it you want?' and lifted him on to his shoulders.
  Farahat told him, 'I want to buy some white paint from that hawker.'
  'Why?'
  'Because I have a black mark I want to get rid of - my galibeyya looks terrible.'
  'Fine, but I don't sell'
  Farahat was taken aback. He needed the paint, but felt he could hardly say, 'Well, give it to me for nothing then!' Farahat realized that this dream was an encounter with God. Here was someone who wouldn't sell, and Farahat wanted to buy, so he fell silent. Finally the man said, 'All right, I will wipe it away for you - but on one condition.'
  'What's that?' Farahat asked. 'Don't get it dirty again.'
  Farahat agreed. The man stretched out his hand and touched the black mark. Looking down at his chest, Farahat saw the mark transform itself into a spot that was whiter than the white of his tunic.
  After that, Farahat fell into a deep sleep, only to have another dream. This time he found a fish on his right hand. A very beautiful white dove came and sat in the same place as the fish - and this scene was replayed in the dream three nights running. Farahat was a bit puzzled by the dream, then put it to the back of his mind.
• Transformation
  Some time after this Farahat stunned his mother Maryam by agreeing to do exactly what she asked without arguing. This was so unheard of that when he did it again and again she got seriously worried about his state of mind! 'What's come over you?' she demanded anxiously, suddenly preferring the awkward son she was used to!
  So Farahat told her about the voices and the dreams. Maryam had a very limited education, but Farahat sensed that God had given her 'very great grace'. She never missed a communion service, and at five O'clock every morning was on her knees in prayer. Her love for God was expressed in her love for her neighbours. She prayed for all the Christians one by one, and many Muslims Would tell her their problems and also ask her to pray for them.
  When Farahat told his mother what had happened, she said, 'My son, the person you met was Christ and the Virgin was with him. He stretched out his pierced hand to wipe away the sin in your heart. This means that you now have a new heart.' The dove, of course, was the Holy Spirit. 'The fish,' she said, 'is a sign that God will give you souls as a result of your turning back to him and living in him.'
  This was the beginning of Farahat's life in Christ, but lots of changes were still to follow. At the time he was nearly seventeen and was hooked on popular, romantic love songs. He even had a book of them. This was the summer of 1958 and as usual Farahat was spending his school holidays on his father's farm. He loved to go out and Watch the workers in the fields and, as he sat astride a donkey would sing these love songs to himself. '
  One morning, though, he woke up to find a voice saying to him, 'No, don't sing those words any more. Now you're going to praise and sing hymns to me.' Straight away and without being fully aware of what he was doing, Farahat got up, found the book of love songs and burnt it. Never again did Farahat revert to singing these songs.
  Sometimes when he met his friends he began to Swear and lie in the way he had been used to doing. But this time God's voice brought him up short. 'No, you're not going to swear and curse any more - you're going to bless.' And whenever Farahat did misuse his tongue, God immediately stopped him.
  When he tried to go to the places he used to haunt before coming to the Lord, God turned him back. 'No, your legs are going to carry you to my house,' a voice within seemed to be saying.
• Village Outreach
  Despite the need to learn new ways, Farahat found he loved going to church and serving the Lord. He longed to preach in the church and reached the point where he said to his father, 'I really want to go out and preach.'
  'The omda (village headman) reads out the sermon in the church,' said his father. 'Who are you to go there and preach?'
  'No, I must go out and preach,' Farahat persisted.
  'But you are still a young boy - you must be out of your mind to think you can preach. Be sensible and don't talk such nonsense,' came the put-down.
  But Farahat had a restlessness within him and a fire in his heart that convinced him he must go and preach in the church and tell people about Christ. Yet no one ever preached in the village church, because the person who acted as priest there was a monk who did not preach. Instead, the omda simply stood up and read from a book of sermons.
  So for the time being, Farahat started where he could - by speaking to his friends who could see that his life had been transformed. In this time of his first encounter with Christ, of repentance, Farahat began to read the Bible, pray and serve in the church. He worked very hard at this time, first in Ismailiyya, where he stayed with his brother, and then in Cairo.
  But even while living in Cairo Farahat felt extremely concerned about the village he was born in, since he knew just how needy it was. So he loved returning to the village with some friends, who like him were Christian lay-workers. Every Sunday they used to get up at six o'clock in the morning to go to the village. They went to mass at the village church and preached there - then out to the surrounding villages, which didn't have any churches at all. They went round the houses, knocking on doors and talking to the people about Christ. Then they took them to a meeting. They also took some children to Sunday school. On such days Farahat would not get home again until midnight. This ministry made as great an impact on his life as it did on those they ministered to.
  It was during this time, in 1964, that Farahat was working on the newspaper called Al-Gumhurriya (The Republic). He had a Christian colleague there called Fahmi Arryan whom he used to talk with about Christ. One day Fahmi said to him, 'You talk to me one-to-one, but why don't you come and see what it's like in our area. It's near to Cairo, but the Cop tic children know nothing about Jesus. They get newspapers and spread them out like prayer-mats, just like the Muslims do. Come and speak about Christ.'
• Deliverance in the City
  Farahat agreed and then spent some time praying to see if God really did want him to serve in that area. It was a satellite town just to the north of Cairo. Eventually he began a ministry there and his partner in this work for some years was Engineer Maqyas Hanna. Together they ran a Sunday school, meetings for young men and women (held separately), and open (all-age, mixed) meetings. And God was glorified through it all.
  This was the first place that God did a miracle through Farahat's ministry. By this time he was engaged to Su'aad, and she was with him. One day they encountered someone who clearly was being affected by evil spirits. Farahat had no idea about praying for the sick, exorcism, etc., but he heard God saying to him, 'Pray'. So that was what he did. He was very thankful and relieved to find that the Lord exerted his authority through him and the evil spirit left.
  This kind of deliverance from demon possession became an ordinary, regular feature of Farahat's work. To the Western mind, this is something spectacular, out of the ordinary, and to the rationalist is a matter for great controversy. Even in the East it is a sensitive issue, and the Coptic Patriarch has decreed that exorcism should not take place in public worship, but only in private. Yet the problem of demon oppression is for many non-Christians part of everyday life. They sense the presence of 'powers' and 'beings'. The things they see around them may change from one state to another, and the way they see reality is in some ways much more like that of biblical times than the average Western Christian's view.!
  This world was not strange to Farahat; he regularly encountered it. He was, if anything, much more excited and challenged to be asked to do what many Western lay people take for granted - to preach in a public meeting. This was in the same area (on the extreme northern edge of Cairo) where the exorcism took place. It seemed that they had only been going there a very short time when Farahat's partner in ministry, Engineer Maqyas, said to him, 'You'll be taking the next service.'
  This invitation - or command - drove Farahat to his knees. He'd never got involved in evangelism or preaching so close to the city. He could do such things in villages, but Cairo was a different matter. There he had served by listening to people and following them up. He had taught in Sunday school, but never taken a public meeting.
  In asking God for guidance about what to say, for the first time Farahat had the experience of receiving a word to give to others. The simple message was 'God is love' 'God so loved the world that he gave his only son, that whoever believes in him would not perish but have eternal life' (John 3.16). Encouraged by what God seemed to be asking him to say, Farahat took the plunge and found himself speaking for about an hour and a quarter.
• Su'aad
  This particular service was the start of a ministry for Farahat in that area that lasted several years. Apart from Maqyas, Farahat's main encourager was his fiancée, Su'aad. From the very beginning of their engagement she got fully involved, sharing with Farahat both in prayer and ministry.
  They plunged enthusiastically into this work even though there was plenty for Farahat to do at the newspaper. In 1967, The Republic had many shattering events to report. In June, President Nasir broadcast his resignation after Israeli planes had destroyed much of the Egyptian air force on the ground. The Israeli army had taken over the Sinai Peninsula. Almost the whole population of Egypt demonstrated in support of Nasir and a war of attrition began with all that that meant in terms of economic sacrifice. '
  It was during this period that Farahat and Su'aad got married. And whatever their material circumstances, they kept their minds and hearts focused on service. Su'aad took responsibility for teenage girls and young Women at a church in a place called AI-Hafzeya. She also accompanied Farahat to the area he ministered in. What started out as a few meetings and a Sunday school grew into a big congregation now known as the Church of the Virgin. From small beginnings, God was using their commitment and faith to achieve greater and greater things.
• NOTES:
1. See Musk, w., The Unseen Face of Islam, p. 16.

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