January 7 marks Christmas Day for Julian Calendar-abiding Orthodox Christians (Eastern and Armenian) and Turkey’s EU Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu has taken the opportunity to wish Turkey’s dwindling Christian population a merry Christmas. Hurriyet Daily News reports:
Anatolia has always been a country of tolerance and home to different beliefs and cultures throughout history, Çavuşoğlu said in a written message.
“Today, we live in peace with our citizens in the Republic of Turkey from different ethnicities and religions and work together to enhance and develop our country,” the minister said.
Yet, Çavuşoğlu’s statement on tolerance comes at a time of increasing tensions between Turkey’s Islamist-rooted government, a majority Muslim population, and a minority Christian population. In Istanbul, the “Rome” of the Eastern Orthodox Church and the seat of the Ecumenical Patriarch since Constantinople’s founding 330, there’s renewed controversy over the status of Hagia Sofia, the former Byzantine church and later an Ottoman mosque that was converted into a museum in 1935.
Deputy Prime Minister Bulent Arinc stated in November 2013 that other faith communities said they’d respect the decision to turn Hagia Sofia into a mosque; the right-wing Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) also a presented draft of a law to parliament that could buttress the conversion. Meanwhile, a number of statements—none from Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew—have come out in support of viewing Emperor Justinian’s brainchild for what it is: A key monument in Christian, not just Byzantine, history.
It’s a new year, and time will tell what happens. Here’s hoping for (at least) the status quo since 1935.
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