Updated at 11:15 a.m. ET: Egypt is working with U.S. Embassy officials to secure the release of 61-year-old Boston pastor Rev. Michel Louis and two others who were abducted while on a church trip to the Middle East, U.S. officials told NBC News on Sunday.

The son of Louis told The Associated Press that his father was on a church trip to retrace Jesus' steps through the Holy Land with 23 other members of the clergy and worshippers when he was abducted. Along with him, a 39-year-old Boston woman in the group and a tour guide were kidnapped Friday.

The AP said an Egyptian Bedouin, Jirmy Abu-Masuh, was the captor – and that he was demanding police release his uncle from prison. It reported Abu-Masuh vowed to take more hostages of different nationalities if his demands were not met.

Gov. Gen. Tayeb Mabrouk of North Sinai said Sunday authorities are seeking to get the kidnapper's uncle released in exchange for the freedom of the three hostages, accoeding to NBC News. The kidnapper has refused to negotiate with three tribal Bedouin chiefs until his uncle is freed. He gave a 24-hour deadline to release his uncle but authorities have asked for more time, NBC News reported. The hostages are fine and being treated as guests, the kidnapper told authorities.

North Sinai authorities have been given orders by the ministry of interior to resolve the situation. 

Rev. Jean Louis said his father was making his annual mission trip to the Holy Land.

"He's been doing it for the past four years now, and this just turned out to be a little different from any other year," said the younger Louis, who works as a youth pastor at a church founded by his father. "He's a diabetic, so we'd like the person that, or the people that have him in captivity, to know that. We're just concerned for his health. But we know that the governments are working very hard negotiating."

A spokesman for the U.S. Embassy told NBC News it was in close touch with the Egyptian authorities as negotiations continue, and that Egypt was “working hard to resolve the situation and bringing about a safe release of the hostages.”

The abduction took place along the road linking Cairo to the sixth-century St. Catherine's Monastery, located at the foot of Mount Sinai where the Old Testament says Moses received the stone tablets with the Ten Commandments.

The route is a frequent target by Bedouins who abduct tourists to pressure police to meet their demands, which is usually to release a detained relative they say has been unjustly arrested.

Friday's abduction was the latest in a series of kidnappings in Egypt's Sinai Peninsula over the past year. Abducted tourists are rarely harmed and usually released within days.

Louis' son said the family is concerned about all three captives and does not want to discuss communications with the U.S. government so as not to jeopardize the chances for their release.

"Any other family or anybody that has loved ones that are in a situation like that can feel ... a bit uneasy," Louis said outside the family home in Boston's neighborhood of Mattapan. "In spirit, we are confident, we believe in God and we know that our God is active and is real and is gonna intervene on our behalf."

The Louis family gathered at the elder pastor's home Saturday to pray and comfort each other. The elder Louis is pastor of the Free Pentecostal Church of God.

"We have a little command center, crisis command center inside and we are trying our best to do what we can do and be very calm in our action also," Louis said. "... we have some good people that are praying for us across the country, across the world ... we thank everybody that's working on our behalf."

Abu-Masuh, of the Tarbeen tribe in Egypt's Sinai Peninsula, told the AP that Egypt's Prime Minister Kamal el-Ganzouri called him personally and asked him to release the Americans "who are guests in our country." He said his uncle called him from prison pleading the same and fearing police might arrest his children or wife to pressure Abu-Masuh.

But Abu-Masuh insists that police release his 62-year-old uncle, who he said suffers from back and heart problems and diabetes. He said his uncle was arrested a week ago after refusing to pay a bribe to police who stopped him along the way.

NBC News' Charlene Gubash and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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BOSTON -- An East African gay advocacy group filed a federal lawsuit Wednesday against Massachusetts evangelist Scott Lively, alleging he has waged a decade-long campaign to persecute gays in Uganda and likened them to Nazis.

The suit was filed in federal court in Springfield against the minister under a statute that Sexual Ministries Uganda says allows non-citizens to file U.S. court actions for violations of international law.

Lively has dismissed the the legal action as "absurd" and "completely frivolous."

Frank Mugisha, who heads the advocacy group, said it was singling out Lively for "helping spread propaganda and violence" against Uganda's gay people.

"We hope that he will be held accountable for what he did in Uganda," Mugisha, who won the Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Award last year, said. "We want to send out a clear message to him and to others."

Lively, of Abiding Truth Ministries, is one of a handful of American pastors whom Ugandan gay activists accuse of having helped draft the original version of the African nation's anti-homosexuality bill.

The bill called for the death penalty for certain homosexual acts such as when gay people with AIDS were caught having sex. It has since been revamped to replace the death penalty with life imprisonment as a maximum sentence.

Gay people likened to Nazis
The suit against Lively, whose Springfield church is known as Redemption Gate Mission Society, is part of wide-ranging legal action Ugandan gay groups are considering against individuals they consider hostile to the rights of homosexuals.

The complaint claims Lively issued a call in Uganda to fight against a "genocidal" and "pedophilic" gay movement, "which he likened to the Nazis and Rwandan murderers."

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About 70 protesters marched Wednesday about a half-mile from the U.S. District Court in Springfield to Lively's business, the Holy Grounds Coffee House.

They dressed in black and beat drums, carrying signs with the names of persecuted Ugandans and coffins to symbolize death allegedly due to persecution. The group spent about 10 minutes in front of the coffee house, leaving white flowers there.

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The suit asks for a judgment that Lively's actions are illegal and violate international law and human rights.

“According to Lively’s own admissions, his influence and work in Uganda date back at least a decade when he visited Uganda twice in 2002 to coordinate with his Ugandan counterparts …. To implement his strategies to dehumanize, demonize, silence, and further criminalize the LGBTI (Lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender and intersex) community,” the lawsuit says.

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It adds that Lively and another anti-gay activist later described the effect of their actions as like a “nuclear bomb.”

The lawsuit says Lively’s work in the country “ignited a cultural panic and atmosphere of terror that radically intensified the climate of hatred in which Lively’s goals of persecution could advance.”

Lively: Comments 'selectively edited'
Lively said in his email that his words have been taken out of context.

"Most of the ostensibly inflammatory comments attributed to me are from selectively edited video clips of my 2009 seminars in Kampala," he said. "I challenge the plaintiffs and their allies to publish the complete footage of the seminar on the Internet. They will not do this or their duplicity would be exposed."

The New York-based group Center for Constitutional Rights filed the suit on behalf of Sexual Minorities Uganda. Center attorney Pam Spees said it also seeks monetary damages.

“While Lively has half-heartedly tried to distance himself from the death penalty provision of the bill, he still considers it the ‘less of two evils’ as compared to recognizing the humanity of LGBTI individuals or permitting their speech or advocacy.”

Lively said Wednesday the legal action was "absurd" and "completely frivolous."

He said in an email to The Associated Press that he has never advocated violence against homosexuals. He said he has preached against homosexuality but advised therapy for gays, not punishment.

Lively also told the AP in November that he advised the Ugandan parliament "to focus on rehabilitation and not punishment."

He said he didn't oppose the criminalization of gays but said imprisonment and the death penalty are too harsh. He was among U.S. evangelicals who visited Uganda in 2009, after which debate began about the bill.

World leaders including President Barack Obama have condemned the Ugandan bill. But the draft legislation is popular in that country, where pastors frequently preach against homosexual behavior.

The Ugandan government said in a statement last month that it didn't support the bill, but that debate about it is allowed under the constitution.

The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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