The Sacred Sites of Cairo

Today's outing was to the religious sites of Cairo.  We viewed a Coptic Christian Church (the hanging church as it's called is built over an old Roman fort).  The picture here was taken during the morning service.  Notice the shaft of light coming down from the ceiling and illuminating the woman praying on the bench.  Now talk about lighting effect-can God do spectacular work or what?

We then went to the area of Cairo that supposedly Mary and Joseph and Jesus fled when he was being pursued by Herod after his birth.  This was to a Jewish community in Cairo, and as it goes with relics--supposedly this crypt was the place they stayed during their time here.  No hard evidence-but great stories and led to some great conversations.

Our final stop was to a Mosque (the Muhamed Ali Mosque) where we saw the daily prayers and inside of the mosque.  Very interesting.

This afternoon I met with Mark Jaffrey--a fellow blogger and Artist.  I met Mark through Randy Elrod's Cre:ate group and will get to see him again in February when we meet again in Nashville. We ventured to his home and met his lovely family.  I'm going to blog about that later this week for Watercooler Wednesday.

Tonight was the farewell reception and dinner for our group.  This has been an outstanding group to travel with and I wouldn't be surprised if some of the group didn't arrange another trip together soon.

We're up and out of here at 4:30 AM in the morning (about 10:30 AM in the States) and will be in the air about 12 hours. Heading home with a head full of memories, but I'm ready to see my family.  End Day.