Christianity in the Middle East  

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Christianity, which originated in the Middle East in the 1st century AD, is one of the major religions of the region. Christianity in the Middle East is characterized by the diversity of its beliefs and traditions, compared to other parts of the Old World. Christians now make up 10%-15% of the Middle Eastern population, down from 20% in the early 20th century.

Cyprus is the only Christian Majority country in the Middle East, with a percentage ranging between 76% and 78% of mainly Eastern Orthodox Christianity (i.e. most of the Greek population). Proportionally, Lebanon has the 2nd highest rate of Christians in the Middle East, with a percentage ranging between 39% and 40.5% of mainly Maronite Christians, followed by Egypt where Christians (especially Coptic Christians) and others account for about 10% and 23% according to different sources.

The largest Christian group in the Middle East is the previously Coptic speaking but today mostly Arabic-speaking Egyptian Copts, who number 15–21 million people, although Coptic sources claim the figure is closer to 12–16 million. Copts reside mainly in Egypt, but also in Sudan and Libya, with tiny communities in Israel, Cyprus, Jordan, Lebanon, and Tunisia.

The Eastern Aramaic speaking indigenous Assyrians of Iraq, southeastern Turkey, northwestern Iran and northeastern Syria, who number 2–3 million, have suffered both ethnic and religious persecution for many centuries, such as the Assyrian Genocide conducted by the Ottoman Turks and their allies, leading to many fleeing and congregating in areas in the north of Iraq and northeast of Syria. The great majority of Assyrians are followers of the Assyrian Church of the East, Chaldean Catholic Church, Syriac Orthodox Church, Ancient Church of the East, Assyrian Pentecostal Church and Assyrian Evangelical Church. In Iraq, the numbers of Assyrians has declined to between 300,000 and 500,000 (from 0.8–1.4 million before 2003 US invasion). Assyrian Christians were between 800,000 and 1.2 million before 2003. During 2014, the Assyrian population of large parts North Iraq largely collapsed due to the persecution and extermination by ISIL.

The next largest Christian group in the Middle East is the previously Aramaic speaking but latterly Arabic-speaking Maronites who are Catholics and number some 1.1–1.2 million across the Middle East, mainly concentrated within Lebanon. Many Maronites avoid an Arabic ethnic identity in favour of a pre-Arab Phoenician-Canaanite heritage, to which most of the Lebanese population belongs. In Israel, Maronites are classified as ethnic Arameans and not Lebanese (together with smaller Aramaic-speaking Christian populations of Syriac Orthodox and Greek Catholic belief).

The Arab Christians mostly descended from Arab Christian tribes or are recent converts to Protestantism. The largest number are adherents of the Eastern Orthodox Church. They number more than 1.5 million. Roman Catholics of the Latin Rite are small in numbers. Most Catholics however are, non-Arab Maronite, Melkites, Catholic Syriacs, Armenians and Assyrians of the Chaldean Catholic Church (from Iraq). Protestants altogether number about 400,000. Arabized Catholic Melkite Christians of the Byzantine Rite, who are either referred as Arab Christians or Greeks, number over 1 million in the Middle East. They came into existence as a result of a schism within the Greek Orthodox Church of Antioch over election of a Patriarch in 1724.

The Armenians number around a million in the Middle East, with their largest community in Iran with 200,000 members. The number of Armenians in Turkey is disputed having a wide range of estimations. More Armenian communities reside in Lebanon, Jordan and to lesser degree in other Middle Eastern countries such as Iraq, Israel and Egypt. The Armenian Genocide during and after World War I drastically reduced the once sizeable Armenian population.

The Greeks who had once inhabited large parts of the western Middle East and Asia Minor, declined after of the Arab conquests, then the later Turkish conquests, and all but vanished from Turkey as a result of the Greek Genocide and expulsions which followed World War I. Today the biggest Middle Eastern Greek community resides in Cyprus and numbers around 793,000 (2008). Cypriot Greeks constitute the only Christian majority state in the Middle East, although Lebanon was founded with a Christian majority in the first half of the 20th century. In addition, some of the modern Arab Christians (especially Melkites) constitute Arabized Greco-Roman communities rather than ethnic Arabs.

Smaller Christian groups include:Arameans, Georgians, Ossetians and Russians.

Converts from other religions such as Islam, Yezidism, Mandeanism, Yarsan, Zoroastrianism, Bahaism, Druze, and Judaism exist in relatively small numbers amongst the Kurdish, Turks, Turcoman, Iranian, Azeri, Circassian, Israelis, Kawliya, Yezidis, Mandeans and Shabaks.

There are currently several million Christian foreign workers in the Gulf area, mostly from the Philippines, India, Sri Lanka and Indonesia. In the Persian Gulf states, Bahrain has 1,000 Christian citizens and Kuwait has 400 native Christian citizens, in addition to 450,000 Christian foreign residents in Kuwait.

Middle Eastern Christians are relatively wealthy, well educated, and politically moderate, as they have today an active role in various social, economical, sporting and political aspects in the Middle East.

Although the vast majority of Middle Eastern populations descend from Pre-Arab and Non-Arab peoples extant long before the 7th century AD Arab Islamic conquest, a 2015 study estimates there are also 483,500 Christian believers from a previously Muslim background in the Middle East, most of them being adherents of various Protestant churches.

See also

• Arab Christians
• Rûm Christians or Rum Millet
• Antiochian Greek Christians
• Tantur Ecumenical Institute
• Middle East Council of Churches