Two weeks after the death of the Greek Orthodox Church of Antioch patriarch in December, church bishops elected Metropolitan John Yazigi as the church's next leader.

Egyptian Christians are mourning the passing of 88-year-old Coptic Orthodox Pope and Patriarch Shenouda III (August 3, 1923—March 17, 2012). He died in Cairo today after a lengthy illness. He had both back and kidney problems, according to local news reports.

Pope Shenouda was extremely popular among millions of everyday Christians. A charismatic reformer and an advocate of Christian rights and interests in a predominantly Muslim country, many considered him to be just like a father.

Egyptian Muslims liked him for his critical stance towards Israel, but both Christian and Muslim intellectuals were critical of his mixing politics with religion. No doubt he was the most influential Christian leader in twentieth-century Egypt. He was co-founder and editor-in-chief of the Sunday School Magazine in 1947, was consecrated as monk in 1954, became Bishop of Education in 1962, and Pope in 1971.

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Image: Chuck Kennedy, White House photo

Updated breaking news:

Compass Direct this afternoon provides a full report on the Christmas eve shooting in Upper Egypt. The death toll is now 7, including 6 Christians and 1 Muslim security guard.

By Edward Ross

LOS ANGELES, January 7 (Compass Direct News) – In spite of threats of violence from Muslims in an area of Egypt wracked by sectarian violence, police declined to increase security for a Coptic Christmas Eve service on Jan. 6, and six Christians were shot to death after leaving the church.

Three men suspected to be Muslims, including one with a criminal record sought by police, were in a moving car from which automatic gunfire hit Coptic Christians who had attended services at St. John’s Church in Nag Hammadi, 455 kilometers (282 miles) south of Cairo. A Muslim security guard was also killed, and nine other Coptic Christians were wounded, with three of them in critical condition, according to news reports.

Copts, along with many Orthodox communities, celebrate Christmas on Jan. 7.

Cross-posted from The Christian History Blog

When theologian George Kalantzis returned to the Wheaton College campus last fall after spending the summer in the Holy Land, he had a very pleasant surprise. While he was out of the country, two donors had approached the college administration about funding a program that would encourage interaction between Eastern Orthodoxy, Roman Catholicism, and Protestantism over their mutual legacy from the early church.

No one at Wheaton knew just how much these donors would fund, but George and his colleagues decided to dream big: they envisioned a Center for the Study of Early Christianity, with a vertically integrated program from undergraduate courses up through master's and doctoral studies.

Their big vision was rewarded.

The Russian Orthodox Church has chosen a new patriarch: Metropolitan Kirill, who has been the interim leader of the Church since Alexy II's death in December. "The election comes at a time of unprecedented popularity in Russia for the church" reports Radio Free Europe.

Kirill is the first patriarch to be elected since the fall of the USSR in 1991.

He is described as "a prominent and politically astute priest with a reputation as a modernizer" and "a politically savvy figure who may seek a more muscular role for the church."

However, he has emphasized his own conservatism and the conservatism of the Russian Orthodox church in the run-up to the election, asserting in speeches that "I speak out categorically against any reforms," and "The defense of the spiritual borders of our Motherland and the preservation of unity, this in the task of the Russian Church."

His relationship with the Catholic church will be closely watched; when Alexy II refused to see the Pope in 2007, it was Kirill who met with him. Many hope relations will continue to warm under his leadership.

While some consider Kirill the most independent of the candidates for patriarch, most assume he will have a close relationship with Russia's politics - even if he helps the church regain some autonomy. "Ties between the Kremlin and the church will get tighter and tighter," Alexander Nezhny, a Russian writer who specializes in religion, told The Los Angeles Times. "Today the Russian Orthodox Church is the de facto state church, enjoying perks and advantages from the state. In the new era, this mutual penetration will be deeper."

Philip Jenkins, one of today's authorities on the global church's past and future, has released another highly regarded - if sobering - account of Christianity outside the West. The Lost History of Christianity (Oxford, 2008) tells the winding story of the faith's rise and fall in the Middle East and Central Asia, particularly in Mesopotamia, which became the center of the early church and its wide-reaching cross-cultural missions. The theologies practiced here, those of the Jacobites and Nestorians, were later considered heretical by the Christianized Roman Empire. Yet most of today's dwindling Iraqi Christian population considers one of the strands its "spiritual ancestor," says Jenkins in his most recent CT article, "Recovering Church History."

Jenkins sat down with Beliefnet editor (and CT contributor) Patton Dodd to talk about the book. Here are some of the most provocative excerpts:

On the Eastern church:

[The] Eastern world has a solid claim to be the direct lineal heir of the earliest New Testament Christianity. Throughout their history, the Eastern churches used Syriac, which is close to Jesus's own language of Aramaic, and they followed Yeshua, not Jesus. Everything about these churches runs so contrary to what we think we know. . . .

Just a suggestion. Perhaps we should think of these Eastern communities - the Nestorians and Jacobites - as the real survivors of ancient Christianity. In that case, the great Western churches we know, the Catholic and Orthodox, are the "alternative Christianities."

On early Christianity and Islam:

Christians survive perfectly well for centuries under Muslim regimes, and the relations between the two are often excellent. In fact, Islam borrows massively from those ancient Christian churches. They borrow a lot of the architectural styles of mosques, the worship practices, and customs like Lent, which becomes the Muslim Ramadan. In fact, if a sixth or seventh century Eastern Christian came back today, that person would probably feel more at home in a mosque than a typical Western church service. That comfort level might change once they explored the doctrines being taught, but the general atmosphere would be very similar. The more you look at these Eastern Christianities, the easier it is to understand that Islam and Christianity emerged as sister faiths.

On ?dying' religions:

We really don't know why religions die, and if they do, in what sense they might leave ghosts. One thing that strikes me is how much a dead religion influences its successor - how for instance the old Christianity left its mark on the successor faith of Islam.

Finally, there is a major theological issue that nobody addresses, the theology of extinction. How do Christians explain the death of their religion in a particular time and place? Is that really part of God's plan? Or maybe our time scale is just too short, and one day we will realize why this had to happen. But as I say, nobody is really discussing these questions.

Read the rest of the interview here, and share your reactions here.

"It's nice to note--for a change--Christians coming together," CT's managing editor, Mark Galli, wrote about the reunion of the Russian Orthodox Church and the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia. Writing in today's Wall Street Journal, Nadia Kizenko isn't so sure.

A long-standing and bitter division in Russian Orthodoxy has ended. An Associated Press article reports on how the the Russian Orthodox Church and the Russian Orthodox Church Outside of Russia can now share pulpits and, more importantly, the Eucharist. The division occurred in the 1920, the church abroad accusing the national church of betrayal when it announced its loyalty to the communist government. Anyone who has followed Russian Orthodoxy knows how deeply divided these groups have been. It's nice to note--for a change--Christians coming together.