Father Lazarus

days of the year in the Coptic Orthodox Church.

It's the kickoff for Holy Week.

Holy Week, we spend 60 to 70 hours in the church praying and chanting and preparing for the resurrection, the crucifixion, the resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ.

It's intense, right?

So Palm Sunday, that's like the kickoff, right?

That's the precursor to everything.

Three churches were bombed, okay?

Everyone thought these extremists did this to throw off our Holy Week services to make people feel scared.

That night, because we go back to church that night, so we spend like six hours in the morning, and then we come back at night for four hours.

That night, usually as Holy Week builds up, like the seats are half empty and then little by little, as we head towards the cross and the resurrection, the church gets more and more packed throughout the week, right?

Usually Sunday night, it's not that many people because we had a long day.

That night, every single Coptic church was filled.

And the priest, it was one priest who was near one of the churches that was bombed.

He gave a sermon.

He said, I want to thank you.

Thank you, you bombers.

Because we call people and we beg people, come to church.

Come on, let go of your life.

Come on, let's start Holy Week from the very beginning.

And you filled it for us with one bomb or a couple of bombs.