POPE TAKES TRAIL OF ANCIENT CHRISTIANITY
By Brian Murphy
AP religion writer
Associated Press
Nov 30 2006
ISTANBUL, Turkey — Under a bright morning sun near the Aegean Sea
coast, Pope Benedict XVI celebrated Mass on Wednesday outside the
ancient stones that some believe were once the home of the Virgin Mary.
He then walked slowly through a hand-picked congregation from the tiny
Christian communities across Muslim Turkey. They chanted "Benedetto"
— his name in Italian — and reached out to touch his gold and
white robes.
The pope had wanted to make this kind of pilgrimage last year —
paying homage to Christianity’s deep history in Turkey and forging
bonds with its modern caretakers.
But Turkish authorities demanded he include a state visit to the
capital, forcing the Vatican to postpone the trip until this week.
Then the pope’s remarks on Islam and the Prophet Muhammad turned the
visit into a struggle to win back the respect of the Islamic world.
So after tense moments and carefully scripted comments on Tuesday in
the capital Ankara — at the opening of his four-day trip — the pope
finally smiled.
After Mass at the shrine of Mary in Selcuk, he playfully took a large
Turkish flag from one of the worshippers.
"They say he’s an enemy of Turkey. It’s not true," said Nuzafer
Kalayci, a Christian from Istanbul.
But it wasn’t only about celebrating. The pope had some somber
messages: paying homage to an Italian priest slain during Islamic
protests and expressing sympathy for the pressures facing religious
minorities in the Muslim world.
That could set the tone for the remainder of Benedict’s trip, which
ends Friday. He is expected to sharpen his calls for what the Vatican
calls "reciprocity" — that Muslim demands for greater respect in the
West be matched by increased tolerance and freedom for Christians in
Islamic nations.
But too much pressure by the Roman Catholic pontiff could risk new
friction with Muslims after broad gestures of goodwill that sought
to ease simmering Muslim anger.
A statement claiming to be from al-Qaida in Iraq denounced the pope’s
visit as part of a "crusader campaign" against Islam and an attempt to
"extinguish the burning ember of Islam" in Turkey. Vatican spokesman
the Rev. Federico Lombardi said the declaration — posted on several
Islamic militant Web sites — shows the need for faiths to fight
"violence in the name of God."
He said "neither the pope nor his entourage are worried."
The pope’s deepening ties with Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew
I — called the "first among equals" of the Orthodox leaders —
also is watched with suspicion in Turkey as a possible challenge to
state-imposed limits on Christian minorities and others. Benedict has
declared a "fundamental" commitment to try to heal rifts between the
two ancient branches of Christianity, which split nearly 1,000 years
ago over disputes including papal authority.
At Bartholemew’s walled compound in Istanbul, the pope stood amid
black-robbed Orthodox clerics and urged both sides "to work for full
unity of Catholics and Orthodox."
The pope began the day at the ruins of a small stone home at the end
of a dirt road near the Aegean Sea — the site where the Virgin Mary
is thought to have spent her last years.
At an outdoor Mass attended by 250 invited guests, the pope noted
the challenges facing the "little flock" of Christians in Turkey.
"I have wanted to convey my personal love and spiritual closeness,
together with that of the universal church, to the Christian community
here in Turkey, a small minority which faces many challenges and
difficulties daily," the pope said.
Benedict went on to honor the memory of a Catholic priest who was
slain in Turkey amid Muslim anger over the publication in European
newspapers of caricatures of Muhammad.
"Let us sing joyfully, even when we’re tested by difficulties and
dangers as we have learned from the fine witness given by the Rev.
Andrea Santoro, whom I am pleased to recall in this celebration,"
said Benedict.
In February, a Turkish teenager shot the Italian priest as he knelt in
prayer in his church in the Black Sea port of Trabzon. The attack was
believed to have been linked to outrage over the cartoons. Two other
Catholic priests were attacked this year in Turkey, where Christians
have often complained of discrimination and persecution.
On Tuesday, the pope urged religious leaders of all faiths to "utterly
refuse" to support any form of violence in the name of faith. He also
said religious freedom was an essential element of democratic values.
He sought a careful balance as he held out a hand of friendship and
brotherhood to Muslims, and expressed support for measures that Turkey
has taken in its campaign to join the European Union.
But winning over Turkish sentiments may be easy compared with the
complexities ahead.
The legacy of Christianity in Turkey is a tangle of historical and
religious sensitivities.
Turkish armies captured the Byzantine capital Constantinople — now
Istanbul — in 1453 to begin a steady decline for Christians, who had
maintained communities in Asia Minor since the time of the Apostles.
As the Ottoman Empire collapsed in the early 20th century, large
numbers of Armenian Christians perished in mass expulsions and
fighting. Turkey vehemently denies it committed genocide against
Armenians, though many nations have classified the World War I-era
killings as such.
Later, in the 1920s, Turkey and Greece carried out a massive population
exchange under the treaty that established modern Turkey, with hundreds
of thousands of Greek Orthodox sent to Greece and smaller numbers of
Muslims going the other way.
Bartholomew heads the remnants of the Greek community in Istanbul that
now number no more than 2,000 among about 90,000 Christians in Turkey.
They represent a powerful symbolic presence for the world’s more
than 250 million Orthodox, which often denounce Turkey for placing
obstacles in the way of Bartholomew and his clerics.
Turkey refuses to acknowledge the "ecumenical," or universal, title
of the patriarch and instead considers him only the head of the
local Greek Orthodox community. The Turkish worry is that granting
wider status to the patriarch could undermine the idea of a single
Turkish nationality — a pillar of the nation’s secular system —
and inspire demands for special recognition by minorities including
Kurds and Muslim groups such as Sufis and Alevis, considered a branch
of Shiite Islam.
Now, Turkish officials are concerned the papal visit and support
for Christian minorities could embolden Bartholomew to press Turkey
for concessions, including return of confiscated property and the
reopening of a Greek Orthodox seminary that closed more than two
decades ago after authorities blocked new students. The EU has also
pushed Turkey for greater religious openness to help its faltering
bid for membership.
"Against the backdrop of universal peace, the yearning for full
communion and concord between all Christians becomes even more profound
and intense," he said at the ancient Christian site.
St. John the Apostle is believed to have brought the Virgin Mary
there to care for her after Jesus’ death. Another belief maintains
Mary died in Jerusalem.
Of Turkey’s 70 million people, some 65,000 are Armenian Orthodox
Christians, 20,000 are Roman Catholic and 3,500 are Protestant,
mostly converts from Islam. Another 23,000 are Jewish.
AP writers Victor L. Simpson and Suzan Fraser contributed to this
report.