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Turkey Allows New Church for First Time Since Ottoman Empire's End i

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  • Turkey Allows New Church for First Time Since Ottoman Empire's End i

    Christian Post
    Jan 4 2015


    Turkey Allows New Church for First Time Since Ottoman Empire's End in 1923


    The imposing structure of Hagia Sophia, located in Istanbul, Turkey.
    The building began as an Orthodox Christian cathedral, was converted
    to a mosque in the 15th century, and was then made into a museum in
    the 1930s.

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    The Islamic government of Turkey has authorized the construction of a
    new church, for the country's tiny Syriac community, for the first
    time since the establishment of the modern republic in 1923.

    The Syrian Christian church will be built on state-owned land not far
    from Greek Orthodox, Armenian and Catholic churches in the Istanbul
    suburb of Yesilkoy on the shores of the Sea of Marmara, Turkish Prime
    Minister Ahmet Davutoglu said at a meeting of religious
    representatives in Istanbul, according to Agence France Presse.

    Of the 80 million people in Turkey, mostly Muslim, about 100,000 are
    Christian. While Turkey was the birthplace of numerous Christian
    Apostles and Saints, the country's government had thus far allowed
    only renovations of existing churches.

    "It is the first since the creation of the republic," the newswire
    quoted a government as saying. "Churches have been restored and
    reopened to the public, but no new church has been built until now."

    The move could be aimed at pacifying the European Union.

    The country was recently criticized for making efforts to erase its
    Christian past, as was reflected in the conversion of an ancient
    Byzantine church into a mosque.

    The Hagia Sophia Museum, a former Greek Orthodox church in the Black
    Sea city of Trabzon, was used in July 2013 for the first Friday
    prayers of Ramadan.

    The mufti of Trabzon was joined by local Muslim residents for the
    Islamic prayers in the 13th century church building. The Christian
    murals were covered with curtains, and the bell dome was used as a
    minaret.

    "The population of this city consists of Muslims. If the majority are
    Muslims, the places of worship need to be mosques. Suppose that the
    majority of this city was Christians or Jews, would they keep this
    place as a museum?" Adnan Ertem, the General Director of Foundations,
    was quoted as saying at the time.

    The church, one of a few dozen Byzantine sites still existent in the
    area and regarded as one of the finest examples of its architecture,
    dates back to the 13th century when Trabzon was the capital of the
    Empire of Trebizond.

    The conversion of the church took place after a local court agreed
    last year with the claim of the General Directorate of the Pious
    Foundations that the church building belonged to the foundation of
    Mehmet II and had been "illegally occupied" by the Ministry of Culture
    and Tourism.

    Turkey had historically embraced Westernization and secularism,
    banning religion from the public square and bringing it under state
    control. However, the ruling AK party is otherwise seeking to align
    with Middle-Eastern and other Muslim nations.

    http://www.christianpost.com/news/turkey-allows-new-church-for-first-time-since-ottoman-empires-end-in-1923-132055/

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