During his thirty-five years of ministry before his assassination in 1981 alongside Egyptian President Anwar Sadat, Bishop Samuel enacted internal spiritual reform in the Coptic Orthodox Church and the Ethiopian Orthodox Church through theological teaching and social service, built community development projects for Egyptians during challenging economic and political transitions, engaged the global Christian community in faithful ecumenism, established and pastored a diaspora Coptic Orthodox community in North America, and deftly led the Church through crisis. In these increasingly divisive times, the North American church needs models of wisdom, leadership and prophetic voice like Bishop Samuel. My project will result in one or more books about his remarkable life and writings to provide that model to the North American church and beyond.

I am among the thousands of Copts whose lives have been affected directly by Bishop Samuel, and among the millions of Christians globally who have been influenced by him indirectly. I want this project to grow his influence even more broadly. Through my research I seek to understand how Bishop Samuel was such an effective and influential spiritual leader for the Coptic Orthodox Church during a period of seismic economic and political change in and outside Egypt.

I have already collected many of his letters and writings, translated some of his Arabic writings and sermons, interviewed multiple lay people and clergy who knew him personally, and accessed archives from his work with the World Council of Churches and his time at Princeton Theological Seminary. As a well-connected, informal leader within the Coptic Orthodox community in North America and Egypt, I have the credibility among those who knew him to write his story with integrity and be given access the remaining documents are available about him, including personal letters.