QUESTIONS AND ANSWERS
Common questions
What people ask about churches and Christian heritage in the Middle East, answered from this directory and its sources.
How many Christians are in the Middle East?
Pew Research Center estimates about 13 million Christians in the Middle East and North Africa in 2020, about 3% of residents, in its June 2025 report. This is a dated estimate for Pew’s MENA region, not a 2026 count or a total for this directory’s 17 countries. Regional definitions differ; the country estimates below use the same reference year.
Which Middle Eastern countries have churches?
This guide documents churches, monasteries and Christian heritage sites in 17 country directories, and has published places in all 17 of them: Egypt, Israel, Jordan, Palestine, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Iran, Türkiye, Cyprus, Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates and Yemen. Coverage describes our research, not the presence or absence of churches in a country.
How many churches are in the Middle East?
This guide has not verified a comprehensive regional total. What we can state is what we document: 327 places across 17 country directories, made up of 270 church buildings, 32 monasteries and 25 other heritage sites, each with a matched Google Maps or TripAdvisor identity. That is a directory count, not a count of the churches that exist.
How many churches are there in each Middle Eastern country?
Published places by country: Egypt 113, Israel 61, Jordan 32, Iran 21, Lebanon 16, Syria 15, Iraq 10, Türkiye 7, Palestine 9, the United Arab Emirates 13, Bahrain 3, Cyprus 12, Oman 4, Yemen 2, Kuwait 6, Qatar 2 and Saudi Arabia 1. Each country page answers the same question in full, including which Christian traditions are represented there. These are counts of profiles this directory has verified, never national totals.
Are there churches in Saudi Arabia?
This guide publishes one place in Saudi Arabia, and it is a ruin rather than a working church: the fourth-century Jubail Church in the Eastern Province, classified here as a heritage site. No public church building is published for the country. That reflects what could be verified, and the guide does not describe worship it has not confirmed.
Are there churches in the United Arab Emirates, Qatar and Bahrain?
Yes. The guide publishes 13 places in the United Arab Emirates, 2 in Qatar, 3 in Bahrain, 6 in Kuwait and 4 in Oman. Several stand on land granted by the ruling family and serve large migrant congregations. Bahrain’s Sacred Heart Church, designated a shrine in 2025, is the historic 1940 building rather than its larger neighbour.
Are there churches in Iran?
Yes. The guide publishes 21 places in Iran, most of them Armenian, in Isfahan’s New Julfa quarter, Tehran, Urmia and Tabriz, together with the chapel at Dzordzor in the north-west. Armenian Christianity in Iran is old and documented: several of these buildings are recognised heritage, and their profiles carry sourced histories and credited photographs.
What are the oldest churches in the Middle East?
The earliest securely dated place documented here is the church at Aqaba in Jordan: archaeologists date its first phase to between 293 and 303, which makes it the oldest known building raised to be a church, older than the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in Jerusalem, dedicated in 335. After those come the Ridge Church at Petra, third or fourth century; Mor Gabriel near Midyat, founded in 397; Mar Saba in the Kidron Valley, 483; the Red Monastery near Sohag, late fifth century; and Saint Catherine’s in Sinai, commissioned by Justinian in the sixth. A site is often far older than the building standing on it: a church has stood at Saint Porphyrius in Gaza since about 425, but the church there today was built by Crusaders in the 1150s. Many buildings here have been rebuilt so often that no single founding year can be asserted.
What denominations do Middle Eastern Christians belong to?
To many. The traditions represented in this directory include Coptic Orthodox, Greek Orthodox, Syriac Orthodox, Armenian Apostolic and the Assyrian Church of the East; the Eastern Catholic churches — Maronite, Melkite Greek Catholic, Coptic Catholic, Armenian Catholic, Chaldean and Syriac Catholic; the Latin Catholic church; and Anglican, Lutheran and evangelical congregations. Each profile names the community a place belongs to rather than treating them as interchangeable.
Which churches in Egypt are linked to the Holy Family?
Coptic tradition connects a route across Egypt with the flight into Egypt, and this guide documents several of its stops: Abu Serga in Old Cairo, whose underground cave is venerated as a resting place; Saint Mary’s at Daqadus, whose well carries the same tradition; and Saint Mary and Saint Abanoub at Samanoud. Matthew describes the flight but names no stopping place, so these identifications belong to devotional tradition rather than to the Gospel text.
Which church in Egypt is where the Virgin Mary is said to have appeared?
The Virgin Mary Church at Zeitoun in Cairo, established and consecrated in 1925. Reported apparitions there from 1968 drew very large crowds of Christians and Muslims alike, and the Coptic Orthodox Church recognises them devotionally; academic accounts study the gatherings as an episode of Egyptian religious life. The church marked its centenary in 2025 with Pope Tawadros II.
Are there churches in Gaza?
Yes, and this guide documents two. The Church of Saint Porphyrius, Greek Orthodox, stands in the Zaytun Quarter of the old city and is the oldest active church in Gaza; a church has stood on its site since about 425, and the present building is Crusader work of the 1150s. The Holy Family Church, completed in 1965, is the only Catholic church in Gaza. Both have been reported harmed during the war that began in 2023: English Wikipedia records that an Israeli airstrike on 19 October 2023 damaged a building in the Saint Porphyrius compound and killed 18 Palestinian civilians, and that the Holy Family and its school have been attacked repeatedly.
Is there a map of churches in the Middle East?
Yes. This guide has an interactive map covering every documented place with published coordinates, across all 17 country directories. You can zoom from the region into a country, then a governorate or locality, and open any church, monastery or heritage site directly from its marker. Positions are published reference points for the sites, not surveyed visitor entrances.
Which churches are in Jerusalem?
Jerusalem is the most densely documented city in this guide: 28 places, more than four times any other. They include the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, held in shared custody by Greek Orthodox, Armenian Apostolic and Roman Catholic communities; the Armenian Cathedral of Saint James in the Armenian Quarter; the Tomb of the Virgin at the foot of the Mount of Olives; Dominus Flevit; and the Lutheran Church of the Redeemer beside the Holy Sepulchre. Each has a sourced history in six languages.
Are there churches in Dubai?
Yes. This guide publishes 3 in Dubai — Saint Mary’s Catholic Church and Holy Trinity Church, both in the Oud Metha area — out of 13 places in the United Arab Emirates. The others are in Abu Dhabi, Sharjah, Ras al-Khaimah, Jebel Ali and on Sir Bani Yas Island, where an early Christian monastery was excavated. The guide records what it can document, and does not set out the legal position on worship in any country.
Which churches can you see in Bethlehem?
This guide documents 3 in Bethlehem itself: the Church of the Nativity, whose fortress-like west front opens onto Manger Square through the low Door of Humility; the Milk Grotto, whose carved façade carries the Jerusalem cross; and Saint Catherine’s, whose lintel reads SANCTAE CATHARINAE VIRGINI ET MARTIRI DICATVM. Just outside, at Beit Sahour, the guide also documents the Shepherds’ Field chapel. All four are photographed.
Which churches are in Nazareth?
This guide documents 6 in Nazareth. They include the Basilica of the Annunciation; the Greek Orthodox church of Saint Gabriel over the spring; Saint Joseph’s; Mensa Christi; the Anglican Christ Church; and the Salesian Basilica of Jesus the Adolescent, which stands above the town on the ridge. Each has a sourced history and, for most, a photograph.
Where is Aramaic still spoken in the Middle East?
Maaloula, in the Qalamoun mountains north of Damascus, is one of three remaining villages where Western Neo-Aramaic is still spoken. This guide documents two of its monasteries: the Greek Orthodox convent of Saint Thecla, built in 1935 around the grotto venerated as hers, and the Melkite Greek Catholic monastery of Mar Sarkis, among the oldest surviving monasteries in Syria, which keeps elements from the fifth to sixth-century Byzantine period.
Every answer here is limited to what the directory can support. Where a number is a count of our own profiles rather than a national or regional total, the answer says so.
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