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Many in the West are congratulating Pope Benedict XVI’s recent trip to Turkey, where in the Blue Mosque he prayed facing Mecca and made other gestures meant to salve the wounds raised by his references to Islam’s history of violence. Personally, I found the whole scene a depressing exhibit of the West’s terminal failure of nerve, one particularly distressing given this Pope’s documented understanding that what we call the “war on terror” is in fact the latest episode in the centuries-long struggle with a militant Islam.

Quake-proof cement mixed '1 300 years ago' November 13 2002 at 04:36PM London - The Sixth Century builders of Hagia Sophia, the Byzantine cathedral still standing in Istanbul, discovered cement with earthquake-resistant properties 1 300 years before anyone else, a research team revealed on Wednesday. Hagia Sophia, built as a church and subsequently turned into a mosque, still stands only because its creators discovered the cement. Many of the surrounding buildings have long since succumbed to the ravages of time, including earthquakes, according to a report in the New Scientist. The structure has withstood quakes of up to 7,5 on...

Editor: Good work by the Turkish police, and the individual who made this known to them, thus preventing it from happening. Two youthful perpetrators are in custody. Ankara (kath.net/KAP) The police have thwarted an attempt to attack one of the most highly positioned Christian leaders in Istanbul, possibly against the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople, Bartholomaios I. As the Turkish press reported on Monday, there were two suspects apprehended of the age of 17 and 18 . Both men, who were armed when they were apprehended, explained afterward their intention that they wanted to become famous. The media was expected to...

It is certainly time that the West considered systematically whether it has irreconcilable differences with Islam. The belligerence of many Islamic spokesmen and the unassimilable quality of many Muslim immigrants in the West, as well as the spectacular terrorist provocations of extreme Islamic groups, make this a very legitimate question. But it is not so easy to answer. Some passages of the Koran, and some of Muhammad’s more purposeful remarks, certainly incite the inference that mortal conflict is inevitable, an impression heightened by the neurotic obsession of a great many Muslims with the red herring of Israel. It is hard...

Since the late 11th century, Western merchants, primarily from the Italian city-states of Venice, Genoa and Pisa, had started appearing in the East. The first had been the Venetians, who had secured large-scale trading concessions from Byzantine emperor Alexios I Komnenos. Subsequent extensions of these privileges and Byzantium's own naval impotence at the time resulted in a virtual maritime monopoly and stranglehold over the Empire by the Venetians.[3] Alexios' grandson, Manuel I Komnenos, wishing to reduce their influence, began to reduce the privileges of Venice while concluding agreements with her rivals: Pisa, Genoa and Amalfi.[4] Gradually, all four Italian cities...

The mother of the messiah has been called many things in the last 2000 years — the Virgin Mary, Our Lady, the Blessed Mother. But call her “the Mother of God� and you’ll see some Christians squirm.This is nothing new. One day in the early fifth century, a priest preached a stirring sermon in the presence of the patriarch of Constantinople. His subject was the holy mother of Jesus. The preacher continually referred to Mary as the “Theotokos� meaning “God-bearer� or mother of God. This was no innovation — Christians had invoked Mary under this title for at least two...

Is Turkey Renaming Istanbul Constantinople? Chances of Turkey and the Kurds reaching a rapprochement are at their highest in 25 years. But what does that mean for Turkification -- and what concessions are the Turks willing to make? BY NICK DANFORTH | SEPTEMBER 4, 2009 Last month, Turkish President Abdullah Gul broke a long-standing national taboo: He called the remote village of Guroymak by its Kurdish name, Norshin. The president's opponents say renaming Istanbul Constantinople on highway signs will inevitably follow. Or worse. For many Turks, saying Norshin leads to saying Kurdistan, and saying Kurdistan leads to recognizing an independent...

Discovering the Greek side of Istanbul The Maiden Tower That Ä°stanbul is a real treasure chest for history, art and architecture freaks is no secret. Its colorful mosaic of historical city structures -- mosques, churches, synagogues, palaces, castles and towers -- reflects the many, many social and cultural influences of a number of foreign communities that have left their indelible footprints across the city throughout its long history. The oldest settlement on the land that is now Ä°stanbul was, however, Greek. Already, in 685 B.C., settlers from the ancient Greek town of Megara chose to colonize the town of Chalcedon,...

Hagia Sophia angel uncovered in Turkey Restoration workers have uncovered the mosaic face of an angel in the world-renowned Hagia Sophia Museum in the Turkish city of Istanbul 29 Temmuz 2009 Çarşamba 02:35 The mosaic, believed to be one of a group of six, was found in the pendentive, an arched triangular section supporting the dome of the monument. Some experts believe the six-winged figure dates back to the 14th century, but the Hagia Sofia Science Board is set to determine the relic's true age by comparing it to similar mosaics found in 1935. Built by the Byzantine emperor Justinian,...

Review: How the Byzantines Saved Europe Posted by JOHN COURETAS on MONDAY, AUGUST 17, 2009 The Oxford Handbook of Byzantine Studies. Edited by Elizabeth Jeffreys, John Haldon, Robin Cormack. Oxford University Press (2008)Byzantium: The Surprising Life of a Medieval Empire by Judith Herrin. Princeton University Press (2008) Ask the average college student to identify the 1,100 year old empire that was, at various points in its history, the political, commercial, artistic and ecclesiastical center of Europe and, indeed, was responsible for the very survival and flourishing of what we know today as Europe and you’re not likely to get the...

Constantinople and Norsin MUMTAZER TURKONE m.turkone@todayszaman.com There is a contradiction in a question posed by Devlet Bahçeli to the president, who referred to Güroymak as Norşin. "Will you also change the signboard reading ‘İstanbul' that you encounter on the highway traveling from Gebze to İstanbul to ‘Constantinople'?" asked Bahçeli. Here are my questions: What will happen if we change it? What change will this make? The answer: Only our habits will change. Why? It is because there is nothing in the name “İstanbul” that belongs to Turks, Turkishness or the Turkish language other than our habits. İstanbul as a name...

Osprey Media. - Peterborough Examiner - Ontario, CA [Emperor] Constantine's Last WalkJunior Fiction winner Local News - Wednesday, July 11, 2007 @ 00:00 By Erik Blackthrone O'Barr Grade 9 Peterborough Collegiate The cannon fire grew closer with each thundering belch of rock and iron, as the walls of Constantinople, wonders of the world that had never been breached save for treachery, groaned under the strain. Buildings crackled with scorching heat, set ablaze by pitch- covered arrows. The shouts and screams of the dying echoed in the empty streets of the once great city. And Constantine XI Palaiologos, last Emperor of...

Aug 14, 2009 From church to mosque: Istanbul’s forgotten Byzantine heritage Is it a church? Is it a mosque? Is it a museum? Aya Sofya (Hagia Sophia, the Church of Divine Wisdom) may be one of İstanbul's most famous buildings, but it's also one that suffers from an acute identity crisis, having started life as the great sixth century church of the Emperor Justinian, before becoming a mosque after the Ottoman conquest of Constantinople in 1453 and then a museum in 1935 after Mustafa Kemal Atatürk declared the Turkish Republic. Something similar happened to Chora, near Edirnekapı, which also kicked...

What happens when you put a Muslim imam, a Christian priest, a rabbi and a Buddhist monk in a room with 10 atheists? Turkish television station Kanal T hopes the answer is a ratings success as it prepares to launch a gameshow where spiritual guides from the four faiths will seek to convert a group of non-believers. The prize for converts will be a pilgrimage to a holy site of their chosen religion -- Mecca for Muslims, the Vatican for Christians, Jerusalem for Jews and Tibet for Buddhists. ...secular Turkey are not amused by the twist on the popular reality...

Moscow, 10 April, Interfax - Bishop Hilarion of Volokolamsk, head of the Moscow Patriarchate Department for External Church Relations expressed his disagreement with the Constantinople Patriarchate urge to govern all church communities in the Orthodox diaspora. "One of the major challenges for inter-Orthodox relations I see the claims of Constantinople Patriarchate to a special role in the Orthodox Church," Bishop Hilarion said at Interfax press conference. "The Orthodox Church is going to be enforced the model of the Catholic Church, which is the most centralized church power leaded by the one bishop of the Universal Church," the Bishop said. He...

The Wars of the Barbary PiratesEssential Histories #66Osprey Introduction Most Americans are unaware that, as a young republic, their nation fought a war with the Barbary pirates, the North African corsairs who plied the waters of the Mediterranean at the turn of the 19th century in search of ships to loot and men to enslave. This is perhaps not surprising, for the wars were conducted on a small scale, over a short period of time, and at a considerable distance from American shores. They were, moreover, the product of one of the most inglorious – even degrading – episodes in...

23 October 2007 Russian Church: Constantinople ruins talks with Catholics Moscow, October 22, Interfax - The Russian Orthodox Church representative to European institutions accused the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople on Monday of seeking to establish itself as the top authority in the world's Orthodox communion and of ruining Orthodox-Roman Catholic dialogue. The representative, Bishop Hilarion of Vienna and Austria, was referring to the 10th meeting of the Joint International Commission for the Theological Dialogue between the Orthodox Church and the Roman Catholic Church. The delegation of the Moscow Patriarchate withdrew from the meeting, held in Ravenna, Italy, in protest against...

Five hundred and fifty-four years ago on this day the Roman Empire was at last extinguished. By then the Empire was, of course, Greek not Roman; Christian not pagan; and no longer strong but pitifully weak. Dispossessed of all its Anatolian and Asian province, and most of its European, all that remained was the great city of Constantinople, much of which was reduced by privation, disease, and depopulation to overgrown ruins. The Turks under a great conqueror, Mehmet II, besieged the city beginning in April, the day after Easter. They outnumbered the defenders at least 10 to 1; possibly the...

INTRODUCTION In the year 380 the emperors Gratian and Theodosius I decided to convoke this council to counter the Arians, and also to judge the case of Maximus the Cynic, bishop of Constantinople. The council met in May of the following year. One hundred and fifty bishops took part, all of them eastern Orthodox, since the Pneumatomachi party had left at the start. After Maximus had been condemned, Meletius, bishop of Antioch, appointed Gregory of Nazianzus as the lawful bishop of Constantinople and at first presided over the council. Then on Meletius's sudden death, Gregory took charge of the council...

ISTANBUL, November 30, 2006 (RFE/RL) -- Are Christianity’s biggest churches heading toward a holy alliance? In a historic step today, Pope Benedict XVI and Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I, the spiritual head of Orthodox Christians, celebrated mass together at Istanbul’s St. George Church. They then signed a joint declaration calling for “uniting our efforts to preserve Christian roots, traditions and values” in Europe. Benedict called the millennium-old division of the world’s 1 billion Roman Catholics and 250 million Orthodox a “scandal.” "The divisions which exist among Christians are a scandal to the world and an obstacle to the proclamation of the...

Pope Benedict XVI has visited one of Turkey's most famous mosques in what is being seen as an attempt to mend relations with the Muslim community. During his tour of the Blue Mosque in Istanbul, the pontiff paused in silent prayer alongside senior Muslim clerics. It marks only the second papal visit in history to a Muslim place of worship. Earlier, the Pope visited the nearby Hagia Sophia Museum - a site heavy with Christian and Muslim symbolism - drawing around 150 protesters. The Pope spent half an hour in Hagia Sophia, a domed complex that was once a Christian...

22 November 2006, 14:54 Moscow Patriarchate is against Constantinople’s attempts to intervene in other Orthodox Churches’ affairs Moscow, November 22, Interfax - The Russian Orthodox Church denies that the Patriarchate of Constantinople can intervene in internal affairs of other Churches and urges to prevent division in the Orthodox world. ‘We deny the Patriarchate of Constantinople’s capacity to intervene in the jurisdiction of other Churches. This idea separates us from Rome at present,’ said the Chairman of the Moscow Patriarchate department for external church relations Metropolitan Kirill of Smolensk and Kaliningrad at the opening of the annual Radonezh festival of Orthodox...

What happened to the 50 tons of gold, silver and sacred treasures looted from Herod's Temple following the Roman legionnaires' sack of Jerusalem on Tisha b'Av in the year 70 CE? The Arch of Titus in Rome, erected shortly after the death of Titus who reigned as emperor from 79 to 81, clearly depicts Roman soldiers bearing on their shoulders the golden candelabrum, silver trumpets and bejewelled Table of the Divine Presence which the Roman emperor Vespasian and his son Titus carted back to Rome as trophies of war. Between 75 CE and the early 5th century, the treasure...

"ORTHODOXOS TYPOS": Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew Denounces Moscow's "3rd Rome" Theory According to the Athens newspaper To Vima of 8 July 2004, Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew responded to the "3rd Rome" theory of the Patriarch of Moscow (which had been brought up for discussion during the 8th International Assemblage of the Russian Orthodox Church) by calling it "...foolish, hubristic, and blasphemous," because "...it resounds with the spirit of caesarpapism and vaticanism; something totally unacceptable to the Orthodox Church." To Vima went on to report that the Ecumenical Patriarch replied specifically to the positions and arguments posited by the attending Church hierarchy and...

There's an icon of the Pope of Rome and the Patricarch of Constantinople in a church in Greece.

It seems a typical scene of urban decay: abandoned buildings, crumbling walls, trash and broken wine bottles. Yet it's more than 1,500 years old. Engineers uncovered these ruins of an ancient Byzantine port during drilling for a huge underground rail tunnel. Like Romans, Athenians and residents of other great historic cities, the people of Istanbul can hardly put a shovel in the ground without digging up something important. But the ancient port uncovered last November in the Yenikapi neighborhood is of a different scale: It has grown into the largest archaeological dig in Istanbul's history, and the port's extent is...

VATICAN CITY, JUNE 30, 2006 (Zenit.org).- Here is the address Benedict XVI delivered Thursday to members of a delegation of the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople, led by Metropolitan Ioannis Zizioulas of Pergamum, who came to Rome on the occasion of the solemnity of Sts. Peter and Paul. * * * Dear Brothers in Christ, With great joy and sincere affection in the Lord, I welcome today your eminence, Metropolitan Ioannis, and the other members of the delegation that his holiness Bartholomew I and the Holy Synod of the ecumenical patriarchate have graciously sent for the feast of Sts. Peter and...

ROMA, March 22, 2006 – In the summer of 2004, when he was a cardinal, Joseph Ratzinger on two occasions defined as “a great error� the addition of Turkey to the European Union. But now that Ratzinger is pope, his position is no longer one of prejudicial rejection. This can be gathered from an article published in the latest issue of “La Civiltà Cattolica,� the magazine of the Rome Jesuits that is examined and approved by the Holy See before being printed. The author of the article is Jesuit Fr. Giovanni Sale, a specialist in the political history of the...

At recent Sunday morning services held at Istanbul’s Holy Trinity Greek Orthodox church, a mere 26 worshipers lined up to receive communion in a nave designed to hold hundreds. With bread in hand they proceeded to circumambulate the church’s four main pillars, with some kissing a giant portrait of Jesus, before leaving. The scene helps illustrate the difficulties facing the Turkey’s Greek community. In addition to adverse demographic trends, church representatives complain that Turkish property legislation is threatening efforts to sustain Turkey’s Greek community. In a country where 99 percent of the population is Muslim, religion has served as a...

Overcoming the church schism is a condition for Ukraine’s welfare - Metropolitan Kirill Kiev, November 25, Interfax - ‘The overcoming of the existing Orthodox schism is an indispensable condition for the economic and cultural welfare of Ukraine’, Metropolitan Kirill of Smolensk and Kaliningrad stated at his meeting with the episcopate and clergy of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church and students of the Kiev Theological Academy that took place last Thursday at the Kiev Monastery of the Caves. The head of the Moscow Patriarchate Department for External Church Relations (DECR) condemned the actions aimed at ‘consolidating the schism with attempts to involve...

".....the most recent hostile demonstrations and threats against the holy center of world Orthodoxy, the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople, in Istanbul, Turkey. This latest assault took place last Thursday, October 28, when groups of Turkish nationalists and other extreme elements demonstrated in Phanar against the Ecumenical Patriarchate chanting slogans such as “one night we’ll come to the Phanar,” “go away Patriarch,” “Patriarch don’t test our patience,” “take the Patriarchate and go to Greece,” and the like. Before police intervened, the angry demonstrators reached the entrance to the Patriarchal compound, and placed a black wreath in front of the gate. ......"

If you believe in the just case that Hagia Sophia should be restored to its proper religious role as a church, for which it was built in the first place, then we ask you to support our petition to the EU Parliament that Turkey should not be admitted as a member of the European Community until it restores Hagia Sophia to its original purpose as a church and not a museum. We need a minimum of 1.000.000 signatures in order to force the European Union to consider this proposal seriously and debate it immediately as one of the conditions to...

Greece’s highest administrative court has rejected an appeal by Esphigmenou Monastery, upholding their eviction from the 1,000-year-old Esphigmenou Monastery. According to court sources, the Council of State ruled that it had no jurisdiction to decide whether the Esphigmenou monks were schismatic, as the Patriarchate has declared. The court decided that, under Greece’s constitution, the patriarchate has supreme spiritual authority over the semi-autonomous Mount Athos monastic community and is not subject to judicial scrutiny of such matters. The monks in Esphigmenou Monastery have been ordered out.

Thursday, October 21, 2004 · Last updated 5:24 a.m. PT Pope makes gesture to Orthodox Church THE ASSOCIATED PRESS VATICAN CITY -- The pope won't be going to Istanbul, but in a gesture to the Orthodox Church he is returning the relics of two saints that were seized by Crusaders 800 years ago, Vatican officials said Thursday. Ecumenical Patriarch Barthlomew I of Constantinople, the spiritual leader of Orthodox Christians, had asked for the return of the relics when he met with Pope John Paul II at the Vatican in June. At that time, he also invited the pope to visit...

BOSTON - The Theological School of Halki of the Ecumenical Patriarchate will not open as was highly expected and despite the many assurances given by the Turkish government to U.S. President George Bush during his visit to Turkey last June, and to Greek Orthodox Church leaders. According to exclusive information acquired by The National Herald, the Council of National Security of Turkey has decided to "freeze" indefinitely the issue of reopening the Theological School of Halki. The Herald has learned that the Turkish Prime Minister Tayyip Erdogan was confronted with strong opposition, even threats, by the military generals and other...

THE FALL OF CONSTANTINOPLE AND THE WEST The coming 29th of May marks the sad 551 st anniversary since the Fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman Turks. Much has been written about this tragic event, but the famous Finish author Mika Waltary has crystallized the impact of this tragedy to the western world, as to what will happen to the west if Constantinople falls, in the following few phrases: "Flesh without spirit," I said. "Life without hope, the slavery of mankind —a bondage so hopeless that slaves will no longer know they are slaves. Wealth without happiness, abun­dance without the...

Wednesday April 14, 2004 PATRIARCH’S PARDONVartholomaios forgives Catholics for sack of Constantinople in 1204 Ecumenical Patriarch Vartholomaios yesterday forgave Catholics for the 1204 sack of Constantinople by crusaders from the Fourth Crusade during a liturgy in Istanbul marking the 800th anniversary of the event and attended by Cardinal Philippe Barbarin, Archbishop of Lyon. “We cannot forget that tragic day for Constantinople and for our Patriarchate but we forgive... and we accept with satisfaction the expression of their regret and the reassurance that the West will never again undertake such an abomination against the Christians of the East,” Vartholomaios said. “It...

1204: What really happened? When Saladin retook the crusader kingdom of Jerusalem for Islam in 1187,Pope Innocent III declared a new crusade to recapture it. But the crusaders ran into financial difficulties and took advantage of Greek imperial in fighting to raise money. The scheme was a disaster, laying Constantinople to waste, gutting its churches and sending many of its citizens into slavery in Europe. The crusaders never went on to Jerusalem, but calcified the mistrust between eastern and western Christendom IN THE history of crusading, the idea that Christians should unite against Muslims for the defence of the Holy...

<p>Having lived nine years in parts of the former Ottoman Empire but never having visited Turkey, the country at the core of that entity, I was looking forward to seeing what its largest city and former capital, Istanbul, looked like.</p>

Crusade vs. Jihad The rage of Muslim fundamentalists against America, the 'Great Satan,' can be traced back to holy wars of the 11th century and winds through a history of European colonialism and Cold War competition. SALIM MANSUR, For the London Free Press On the Sunday following 9/11, President George W. Bush spoke to Americans reeling from the shock of terrorist attacks on New York and Washington. The twin towers of the World Trade Center had collapsed, but the fires and smoke from Ground Zero were still visible and painted Manhattan's skyline in dull brown and grey. Bush appealed for...

A few days before the fall of Constantinople to the armies of Ottoman jihad, some six centuries ago, a strange debate was taking place inside the imperial city. Constantinople then had a very loud senate, stubborn theologians, and merciless philosophers. It was the heir to Greco-Roman civilization, but also host to hot debates — so hot that they effectively isolated the city's elites from the realities of then-world politics. The political establishment of the Eastern Rome was consumed in complex rhetoric — what historians would later call "Byzantine debate." Just days before the city fell to the Islamic armies...

The Fall of Constantinople 1453 Back to "Decline of the Byzantine Empire" Chronology Back to "Ottoman Empire" Chronology The siege of Constantinople, the capital of the Byzantine Empire and one of the most heavily fortified cities in the world, took place in 1453. Sultan Mehmed II, ruler of the Ottoman Turks, led the assault. The city was defended by, at most, 10,000 men. The Turks had between 100,000 and 150,000 men on their side. The siege lasted for fifty days. The Turks employed various important war tactics in taking over the city. They used huge cannon to destroy the...

PORTLAND, Oregon, 3 March 2003 — Suppose Islam lost a great war. What would the consequences be? Some believe it will cause terrorism to erupt, disrupt the globe’s largest reserves of oil — the life-blood of the modern age — and plunge the Arab world into an age of fanaticism and darkness. But as we verge on a controversial war with Iraq, there is a fascinating — and surprising — lesson to be learned from another great battle in history. On May 28, 1453, two of the greatest armies in the world ended an epic 52-day battle on the border...

Patriarch Celebrates Divine Liturgy in Ravenna; Plans to Sign Declaration with Pope VATICAN CITY, JUNE 9, 2002 (ZENIT.org).- A step toward full unity between Catholics and Orthodox was taken when, for the first time in a millennium, a patriarch of Constantinople celebrated the Divine Liturgy in the Byzantine basilica of Ravenna. John Paul II, at the Vatican, applauded today´s event, which he said helps "encourage us to continue on the road toward full unity between the Christian East and West." For the first time since the schism of 1054, an Orthodox patriarch of Constantinople celebrated the Divine Liturgy in...