St. Mary – Pittsburgh, PA In 1970, there was a group of young people and their families living in the city of Pittsburgh. When the venerable Father Bishoy Kamel came to the United States for service, Father Raphael Nakhla, the priest in Montreal, Canada, asked him to serve this group in the city of Pittsburgh. Father Bishoy organized for them to have a liturgy every two months, and the first liturgy in the city was held in 1970 at the home of Dr. Charlie El Gawhary, attended by about 10 individuals. The number of households continued to increase, and they formed a board and appointed a treasurer to collect donations in preparation for buying a church specifically for them. In 1974, Dr. Mikhail Girgis also came to Pittsburgh from Toronto and shared his expertise with us as a member of the Church Council in Toronto. He advised us to register the church in the state, and we registered it under the name: “The Coptic Orthodox Church in the city of Pittsburgh and Western Pennsylvania.” In 1982, we purchased our first church at 300 Maplewood Ave, Ambridge, PA 15003. It was a church affiliated with the Greek Orthodox Church with an educational building attached to it. The owners of the church informed us that they were praying for the church to be sold to another Orthodox church, so they gave us the church for free, only asking for the educational building which cost them $100,000. They requested us to pay only $70,000. Since we all wanted to avoid loans at that time, our decision was to each donate what we could. With the help of the Lord, we managed to raise $62,000 and we didn’t know how to raise the remaining $8,000. God intervened and sent us an unknown person who donated a check. When we received the check, we were surprised to find it was for $8,000, completing the amount required in a miraculous way, and thus we were able to purchase the church. On the second of April 1982, in memory of the appearance of the Virgin Mary at the Church of Zeitoun in Cairo, we held the first liturgy prayer in our church, which we named after the Virgin Mary. By purchasing the church, we were able to arrange the Divine Liturgy prayers twice a month on Saturdays in collaboration with some of the fathers, such as (Father Tadros Ya’qub Malti, who prayed the first Liturgy in English / Father Markos Markos from Toronto / Father Mikhail Edward from Cleveland, Ohio / Father Raphael from Michigan). They used to come on Friday evenings to hold a Bible study and conduct the Liturgy prayers on Saturday mornings. To organize the church education service, we followed the curriculum of the Toronto church. Throughout this period, a group of 20 of us agreed to take the Pain Week off each year as a vacation and travel to Cleveland to attend the Pain Week prayers and Easter there. Dr. Adel Armanious was teaching us the church hymns. The first full-time priest of the church was Father Youhanna El-Samouéli, who attended our church for service, leading to the establishment of a stable ministry. Activities increased in addition to regular Liturgies every Sunday and Sunday schools. There were many summer activities such as the Bible study retreat, Hallelujah concerts which were replaced by Halloween parties, and family retreats. Our father Yohannes continued serving the church until His Eminence Bishop Agathon requested him to return to the monastery in Egypt like the rest of the monks who serve in the United States. After the departure of our father, Father Yoannis El-Samuelly, we were blessed by the service of His Grace Bishop Agnatius, Bishop of Suez, who came to Pittsburgh for medical examination and treatment, where the weekly liturgies continued on Sundays. It is worth mentioning that the residents surrounding the church told us that they heard hymns coming from the church one night and in the early morning, they saw a group of people leaving the church dressed in priestly attire. During his visit to Cleveland, His Holiness Pope Shenouda ordained a group of deacons for the church, and Father Michael Edward arranged a meeting with his holiness for us. The main request from His Holiness was the church’s need for a full-time priest to serve it. In 1987, His Holiness blessed us with the presence of our father, Father Bishoy Mikhail, as a permanent priest for the service of the church. In 1989, His Holiness Pope Shenouda consecrated the ancient church. With the service of our father Abouna Bishoy, the church continued to grow until the existing church became too small to accommodate the worshipers. It required a lot of maintenance, so attention turned to purchasing a new, larger church to accommodate the increasing number of worshipers. In 2006, we purchased the current church located at 995 Melrose Ave. (Corner of 10th Street and Melrose), Ambridge, PA 15003. It is a Catholic church with a priest’s house attached which we now use for spiritual retreats that require an overnight stay in the church. There is also a school building with 8 classrooms that we used for Sunday school classes. Additionally, we acquired a garage and a piece of land adjacent to it, with an unused building that we turned into a garage for the worshipers’ cars. Later, in 2008, we renovated and converted the building into a sports hall for the church’s youth. The first liturgy was held there on the Feast of the Virgin Mary on August 22, 2006. His Holiness Pope Shenouda inaugurated the new church on February 6, 2007, in a grand celebration covered by all local newspapers, with his image featured on their front pages. On June 2, 2018, His Grace Bishop Karas of Pennsylvania ordained Mr. Shaker Nakhla as a priest in the church under the name Father Daniel Nakhla. He spent 40 days of seclusion in the Monastery of St. Bishoy in Wadi El Natrun and then returned to the church to celebrate his first liturgy on July 9, 2018. In the same year, 2018, elections were held to appoint a new council for the church. In February 2020, the church bought a piece of land adjacent to it for use as a reserve parking lot for the worshipers and for any future expansions. His Eminence Bishop Karas blessed it on March 1, 2020. In March 2021, the church built and equipped the Church of the Great Martyr Saint Mena and Pope Kyrillos VI in the school building, which accommodates 120 worshippers instead of the small church that was previously there, which could only accommodate 30 worshippers. On August 8, 2021, His Eminence Bishop Karas of Pennsylvania and its affiliates ordained the Subdeacon Magdy Habib as a full deacon under the name of Deacon Maximus Habib to assist the fathers in the ministry. Address:
Priests of the Church:
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