POPE PERFORMS A PR MIRACLE
Sandro Contenta

Toronto Star, Canada
European Bureau
Dec 2 2006

Benedict XVI turns Turkish trip into surprising success

ISTANBUL-Seen through Turkish eyes, the Pope was a charmer till
the end.

He began his visit by proclaiming, "I love the Turks," and ended
it yesterday with a rhetorical offering sure to fuel the gushing
newspaper headlines.

"A part of my heart remains in Istanbul," Benedict XVI told Turkish
officials moments before boarding his plane back to Rome. The
Roman Catholic pontiff even had a thought for the city’s 10 million
residents, acknowledging they "suffered" through traffic chaos caused
by the closing of roads in a massive security lockdown.

The parting words of affection capped a four-day visit that saw
the pontiff transformed from a man reviled to "the congenial Pope,"
as an editorial in the influential Hurriyet newspaper put it. For a
pontiff who sparked outrage in much of the Muslim world two months
ago by linking Islam to violence, the transformation seemed nothing
short of miraculous.

Dreadfully low expectations certainly helped. And the major
stakeholders in the trip – the Turkish government, the Vatican and
Turkey’s Christian minorities – also had an interest in making sure
it was a success.

Vatican officials describe the visit – particularly the pontiff’s
silent prayer at Istanbul’s Blue Mosque – as a landmark on the path
to reconciling Islam and Christianity.

Judging by headlines such as "The Istanbul Peace," the visit went
some way to achieving that goal in this officially secular country.

Similar effusiveness in the rest of the Muslim world, where many
still demand an apology for Benedict’s comments on Islam, will be
far harder to come by.

But the Grand Mufti of Istanbul, Mustafa Cagrici, was poetically
optimistic.

"A single swallow can’t bring spring, but many swallows will follow and
we will enjoy a spring in this world," he told the Pope, after sharing
a moment of prayer with him Thursday at the 17th-century Blue Mosque.

The trip was fraught with the burden of history and contemporary
concerns of a "clash of civilizations:" A pontiff seen as having
toughened the Vatican’s stand on Islam visiting the ancient seat of the
Holy Roman Empire before the Ottomans and Islam swept it aside in 1453.

An anti-Pope protest by 25,000 people and the initial reluctance
of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan to meet the pontiff had many
fearing the worst on the eve of his visit.

But Benedict XVI landed in Ankara Tuesday, walked into a meeting with
a suddenly available Erdogan and began his charm offensive. Erdogan
emerged to announce the pontiff had reversed his position and now
backed Turkey’s bid to enter the European Union. The Vatican nuanced
Erdogan’s claim, but didn’t deny it.

With Turkey’s EU negotiations stumbling, the surprise announcement
instantly changed the complexion of the Pope’s visit. Erdogan reaped
the benefit of having turned around a pontiff who once described
Muslim Turkey as being in "permanent contrast" with Europe’s Christian
heritage.

The Pope then sat quietly as Turkey’s director of religious affairs
denounced those who believed Islam was spread by the sword – a
not-too-veiled reference to the papal speech that caused so much
outrage. "Once the Pope swallowed that, suddenly every negative
thing about him was forgotten and everybody fell in love with him,"
said Murat Belge, a leading left-wing social critic.

The Pope called for a sincere dialogue between Muslims and
Christians. By the time he became only the second pope in history to
pray at a mosque, the pontiff could do no wrong.

Yet Benedict never shied away from topics that, in another context,
would have caused a political storm. He joined Patriarch Bartholomew
I of Constantinople in calling for more freedom for Turkey’s dwindling
Christian communities. They made it a condition for EU membership.

The Pope also praised Armenians for clinging to Christianity despite
"the very tragic circumstances of the last century" – a reference
to the slaughter of Armenians by Ottoman Turks in 1915. He didn’t
call it genocide – the Vatican’s official position – but the mere
mention of an event Turkey refuses to accept responsibility for no
doubt strained sensitivities in Ankara.

Niyazi Oktem, a political philosopher at Istanbul’s Bilge University,
said the visit should act as an example to both sides in the so-called
"clash of civilizations." Turkey showed other Muslim states the
strength of its democracy by having a civilized dialogue with the
leader of the world’s 1.1 billion Roman Catholics. It also showed
Europe how the Turkish model has kept fundamentalist Islam at bay,
Oktem added.

The Pope left relieved, but with little desire to push his luck.

Invited by Istanbul’s governor to visit Turkey again, Benedict XVI
smiled and politely declined.

"I’m old and I don’t know how many more hours the Lord will give me,"
the Pope replied. "I’m in His hands."