BACKGROUND: THE DIMINISHING CHRISTIAN COMMUNITY IN TURKEY
Deutsche Presse-Agentur
November 27, 2006 Monday
DPA POLITICS Turkey Religion Pope BACKGROUND: The diminishing Christian
community in Turkey dpa infographic 3184 available Ankara One of the
biggest issues on the agenda of Pope Benedict XVI’s visit to Turkey
starting on November 28 will be the state of Christian minorities.
There are no official figures on the number of Christians living
in Turkey but estimates put the figure at no higher than 100,000,
or around 0.15 per cent of the total population. Of these, only a
tiny minority are Roman Catholic.
Those numbers used to be much much higher but events over the past
century have led to sometimes massive decreases, sometimes gradual.
During the First World War Armenian Christians sided with Russia
against the Ottoman Empire and when the Russian armies disappeared
from eastern Turkey following the 1917 Bolshevik revolution, the
Ottoman authorities moved to expel from Turkey Armenians living in
the east of the country.
While Turkey denies that the subsequent massacres actually
constituted a genocide, it does admit that hundreds of thousands were
killed. Armenian historians claim as many as 1.5 million Armenians
died. The numbers may be in dispute, but there is no argument that
the massacres and the subsequent emigration of others completely
changed the religious make-up of the nation. Estimates put the Armenian
Christian population today at just 70,000.
Just a few years later, following the war of independence and
the founding of the modern Turkish republic, came the exchanges of
population with Greece that saw Muslims in Greece sent to Turkey and
Orthodox Christians sent the other way.
In spite of those events there were still sizable Christian minorities
in Turkey but over the years the numbers have dwindled further, both
due to natural emigration but also due to events such as in 1956,
when a pogrom against the 100,000 strong Greek Orthodox community in
Istanbul led to thousands leaving the country.
Today, there are only around 5,000 Greek Orthodox Christians living
in Istanbul.
Despite the minuscule numbers the Turkish authorities still today
are deeply suspicious of Christian minorities. In the past a wealth
tax imposed on minority groups, including Jews, impoverished many.
Today there are still problems for minority religious groups regarding
the owning or repair of property.
The Greek Orthodox Church also complains that the state closed down a
seminary on the island of Heybeli in 1971. Despite repeated calls from
the European Union to allow the seminary to reopen, the government of
Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan has refused to move on the matter.
Turkish analysts have said that Erdogan’s hands are tied because he
has been thwarted by the fiercely pro-secular military in watering
down restrictions on the wearing of the Islamic-style headscarf in
public offices and universities.
The prime minister’s own daughters attend university in the United
States because they cannot wear the headscarf to school in their
own country.
As for the public at large there is certainly no obvious hatred of
Christians. There are no complaints concerning the behaviour of the
millions of western tourists who flock to Mediterranean resorts each
summer but there have been a number of attacks on Christians in some
of the more conservative areas of Turkey.
In February an Italian Catholic priest was shot dead by a 16-year-
old boy in the town of Trabzon. The exact motive for the murder has
not been revealed, the court was held behind closed doors.
Syrian Orthodox Christians have also complained that Kurdish families
have taken over their properties and churches in south-east Turkey
after they were forced to leave them due to poverty and conflict.
Evangelical protestant groups also complain of harassment by the
authorities.
Christians may not be high in numbers in Turkey but their plight
will be high on the agenda when Pope Benedict XVI arrives in Ankara
on November 28.