‘If you ignore what’s going on in Europe, you’ll become a minority in your homeland’

The Coptic Christian Bishop Damian of the Höxter-Brenkenhausen Diocese in Germany has given the West a stark warning. But he is unlikely to be heard, as his words cut sharply against the prevailing wisdom in Germany and all over Europe. Western Europeans appear to have decided to commit civilizational suicide. Who is Bishop Damian to stand in their way?

In a video posted on X Tuesday, Bishop Damian says: “I can assure you that if you shy away from it and do nothing, then what has happened to us in Egypt will happen in your homeland, too, and if you learn nothing from history, you’re up next. Take it seriously.” What is “it” that happened to the Copts in Egypt and now threatens Germany and the West? Conquest and Islamization. Aware of how his warning was certain to be characterized in the establishment media, if they took any note of it at all, Bishop Damian continued: “I am not a hate preacher, I have many friends among the Muslims. I am not trying to spread fear. We should not be afraid.” Indeed. We should be resolute in the face of evil, and aware of what confronts us.

That was why Bishop Damian went on to exhort Germans, and all Westerners, to be aware of the history of jihad:

But we must learn from our past. We were once the rulers of our fatherland, our country [Egypt]. Today, we are struggling just to get by, struggling to survive. Pay attention to their growth curve. That curve alone is indicating that if we don’t act, we will be a minority in our own country. And we know how Islam behaves when it is in power and majority, compared to how it behaves when in the minority. I am warning you. Take the situation seriously. My story is your story. My Christian past is your roots. Learn from our past, learn from our situation today. Look towards the future, a future which begins today. That is why I raise my voice, to say that we should not look the other way. We must act together, and secure a safe country for our children. We have to do this for our children, so that they won’t be treated as second- or third-class citizens and regarded as inferior human beings in their own homeland.

One thing is certain: Bishop Damian’s warning will not be heeded. But he is one-hundred-percent correct. When Arabs conquered Egypt in the late 630s, it was nearly entirely Christian. Today it is around ten percent Christian. The Christians of the country, however, did not emigrate; they’re still there. The Muslim population of Egypt is almost entirely comprised of the descendants of people who converted from Christianity to Islam.

Did they convert because they were convinced of the truth of Islam? Were they convinced by Islam’s “wisdom and beautiful preaching” (Qur’an 16:125)? Maybe a few here and there, but for the most part, the Christians of Egypt converted to Islam over the centuries because the Islamic authorities made life so difficult for Christians, all while holding out the prospect of conversion to Islam as relief from all manner of institutionalized and state-sanctioned discrimination and harassment. That’s what Bishop Damian is referring to when he says: “We have to do this for our children, so that they won’t be treated as second- or third-class citizens and regarded as inferior human beings in their own homeland.” The Christians of Egypt have been treated as second- or third-class citizens and regarded as inferior human beings in their own homeland since the seventh century, and that’s the primary reason why there are so few of them left.

As this treatment is sanctioned, and indeed called for, in Islamic law, it has occurred not just in Egypt, but all over the Islamic world. The once-thriving Christian communities of the rest of North Africa were entirely eradicated. So were the Zoroastrians of Iran, and so very many others. The tiny communities of Christians and other religious minorities in the Islamic world are the living remnants of communities that have been persecuted and harassed for centuries, targeted so that Islam will ultimately replace them entirely and religion will be “all for Allah” (Qur’an 8:39).

If Bishop Damian had not been an Egyptian, but an American non-Muslim, and said the same things that he said, he would be excoriated as a “racist” and an “Islamophobe.” He may be in for that treatment anyway. In Germany and all over the West today, the political and media elites are not interested either in hearing the truth or in allowing it to be told. And so the good Coptic bishop will be proven correct.