Tide of Nationalism Threatens Istanbul’s Greek Orthodox Community

by Anne Szustek

Rising Islamism and nationalism within Turkey are hurting Istanbul’s once robust Orthodox Christian community. Possible EU accession has brought the situation into the limelight.

Istanbul’s Orthodox Patriarchate Fighting for Survival

In 2007, 42 of the U.S. House Foreign Affairs Committee’s 50 members sent Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan a letter pleading on behalf of the Eastern Orthodox Ecumenical Patriarchate, established in Istanbul in the 4th century. Bartholomew I, the leader of the world’s 300 million members of Eastern Orthodox churches, sits in the Patriarchate’s headquarters in Fener, a blighted neighborhood on Istanbul’s Golden Horn.

Former Rep. Tom Lantos, D-Calif., then the head of the committee, called the patriarchate “one of the world’s oldest and greatest treasures.”

Tide of Nationalism Threatens Istanbul’s Greek Orthodox Community.