NEW YORK – Archbishop Demetrios of America has expressed his deepest sorrow and his strong and unequivocal condemnation for 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.
Archbishop Demetrios in his statement of condemnation said, “I express my deepest sorrow for the events that transpired outside of our Ecumenical Patriarchate last Thursday. The actions of these Turkish extremists-nationalists are appalling and condemnable in and by any civilized country. These are actions against a holy institution which survived and lives on through the centuries. It’s an institution highly respected by the entire civilized world. These demonstrators are short changing themselves and Turkey, as they paint a picture of uncivilized, petty, narrow-minded people.”
“As a Church and as Orthodox in America, we are in spirit and in prayer by the side of our Ecumenical Patriarchate, and we stand in full support with love and care towards our Mother Church as we are reassured that He Who has many times saved this Patriarchate and has protected it in difficult times will once again be next to our Ecumenical Patriarch and the Fathers of the Great Church of Christ and He will lead this crisis to a favorable result according to the teachings of our Lord, that God, ‘will not break a bruised reed, and smoking flax He will not quench, till He sends forth justice to victory’ (Matt. 12:20).”
It is very important not to blow this incident out of proportion, but to understand it’s true significance. First, the Turkish nationalists are a fringe group and thier views do not necesarily reflect those of the Turkish government. Second, Turkey is a country where the police actively monitor and supress political expression so the nationalists could not have demonstrated without government approval. Third the Turkish government allowed this demonstration to send a message to Greece: They can play nice or they can play rough. Since there was no real violence, we can see that these demonstrations were for public relations effect only, but there was the implicit threat that these thugs could be unleashed on the Patriarchate if the situation between Greece and Turkey deteriorates.
The status of the Greek Orthodox seminary in Istanbul is only one of a number of issues creating tension and conflict between Turkey and Greece. The two nations are also in conflict over the resolution of the status of Northern Cyprus and the Greek 12-mile terrtorial claims around Greek islands in the Aegean which the Turks claim turn that sea into a Greek lake and shut them out. So the Turks are clearly using the seminary as bargaining chip in order to seek favorable resolution of their other issues. Concessions in the Aegean and Cyprus are the quid pro quo that Turkey is looking for in exchange for reopening the seminary.
I don’t see how one nation gets another nation to accede to its demands through threats and insults alone, especially when the latter is a lot bigger than the former. Insults do not set agood tone for negotiation. The Greeks need to resume positive engagement, set aside the belligerent rhetoric, and be cool and shrewd negotiators. Turkey could use Greek support for it’s EU membersip bid and Greek cooperation on trade and oil pipleine issues. The question is what price to set for this support.
The Tactics of Thugs Against a truly Oppressed Minority
I am amazed at the way that you accept thuggish tactics from the Turks. The thugs were making clear that they were willing to use violence against a religious establishment. The Turkish government was making clear that they would not stop those thugs.
I find it astonishing that you would use this sentence structure. “The status of the Greek orthodox seminary in Istanbul is only one of a number of issues creating tension and conflict between Turkey and Greece.” In this sentence the seminary is “[an] issue [] creating tension.” This sentence structure makes the seminary the active agent in the conflict. MApparently Christians are the only “oppressed minority” about whom you do not care.
Turkey doesn’t need Greek support for its EU membership because it is succeeding in cowing and bullying the EU very well without it. This is yet another reason for intense disagreement with the Bush administration which is pushing Turkish entry into the EU. EU doesn’t have the strength of culture to withstand the cultural impact of the influx of Muslims, it will drown under the cultural pressure. We should start planning right now for saving the Louvre, the Sistine Chapel, Notre Dame and other Christian cultural treasures.
You have a double standard Dean. You allow thuggish tactics from Muslims as somehow normal and “to be expected” yet other in the West are judged by the Marquis of Queenbury rules and the strictest interpretation of any and all “human rights” codes.
Missourian: You prodded me into reconsidering this indicent. I agree with you, the Turkish government’s cruel, vieled threats against a peaceful religious organization are ominous, dispicable and inconsistent with the civilized norms we would hope the European Union require its applicants to comply with.
I certainly did not mean to justify behavior of the Turkish government, only to place their actions within their geopolitical context. There are a number of unresolved issues between Greece and Turkey. If these issues can be resolved, it may likely enhance the security and freedom of the Patriarchate. If the issues cannot be resolved, then the Patriarchate is in a very vulnerable and dangerous position, and we have cause for fear.
The hope, and it may be a naive hope, is that bringing Turkey into the European Union will strenthen Turkey’s more moderate and progressive forces and bring about economic advancement, religious tolerance and political liberalization in that nation. Critics of the Turkish EU bid are correct to ask whether expectations of tolerance and liberalization are possible given the rise of Islamist movement in Turkey amd the Turkish government’s history of politcal represion. I just started reading the novel “Snow” by respected Turkish author Orhan Pamuk. It provides an accurate but unsettling portrait of the tensions roiling Turkey between the rising Islamic fundamentalist movement and the secular, but authoritarian heirs of Kemal Attaturk.
“A central concern in all of Pamuk’s novels is Turkey’s troubled love-hate relationship with the West. .. It was the dramatic worsening of tensions between the Muslim East and the West that finally led Pamuk to write Snow. For the first time in his life, the rise of political Islam in Turkey made him realize that there might be no future for him in his homeland. .. The novel vividly portrays the cruelty and intolerance of both the Islamic fundamentalists and the representatives of the secularist Turkish state.
http://www.levantinecenter.org/pages/orhan_pamuk.html
Another hope is that the leaders in Greece and Turkey will realize have much to gain from peaceful engagement and much to lose from a deterioration of relations that leads to military conflict. That is why we should be cautious about choosing words that may accelerate such a deterioration.
Note 3 Dangerous Kind of Social Work
You seem to advocate allowing Turkish admission to the EU because you think that Turkey’s admission will and promote moderation in Turkish politics. This seems to be international diplomacy as therapy for troubled societies. In the course of the negotiations between the EU and Turkey, the EU has caved in and retreated on its demands on Turkey. It has shown Turkey that the EU can be bullied rather easily, these things are not lost on Turkey’s leaders.
Any decision must be evaluated based on BOTH the positive possibilities and the negative possibilities.The potential negative consequence of admitting 70 million Turks and many other Muslims rushing to Turkey to qualify for entrance in the EU is overwhelming. It is the virtual destruction of European culture, an important historical home of Christianity. Let the Turks first prove that they can treat their own ethnic and religious minorities fairly.
The news is full today of reports of riots by Muslim in their Paris ghettos. Six days running. The French have not openly admitted that they have Muslim enclaves which are virtual “no-go” zones for French citizens AND the French officials such as police and fire. This is a terrible problem and a terrible indicator of what is to dome.
Let the Turks solve their own problems. Promote trade and cultural exchanges but save our cultural homeland from being overrun by Islam.
Dean, the “unresolved issues” between the Greeks and the Turks mostly arise from hundreds of years of cruel, inhumane oppression by the Turks against our brothers and sisters. In case you have forgotten, when the Greeks raised the revolt that led to their independence from Turkey in 1821 the Turkish response was to march into the Phanar while the Ecumencial Patriarch was celebrating Pascha, drag him out, behead him and stick his head on a pike at the gates. We also have thousands of new martyrs from that time whose only crime was that they were Greek Orthodox Christians under Islamic rule. I don’t see much change in the Turkish approach.
I’ll be happy to think about forgiveness when the Turkish leaders in sack cloth and ashes repent for their own crimes against Christians as well as fully and completely acknowledge the Armenian genocide and the depradations during the Greek war of Independence.
After all nothing less is demanded for far less inhumane treatement of the aboriginal tribes of the United States in our past within the same time frame when we have made far more progress in rectifying our oppressive actions.
“Athens to have say on Turkish EU goals: Most of the demands Athens has made in relation to Turkeyâ??s European Union accession are to be raised today when Brussels assesses the progress Ankara has made over the last year, sources told Kathimerini yesterday.
Turkey is hoping that the annual EU report will lead to â??market economyâ?? status being granted to Ankara. The move would be a significant boost to the Turkish economy and efforts to harmonize its laws with EU legislation.
However, sources indicate that even if the report grants the status Ankara desires, Turkey will be left in no doubt about the obligations it has to meet before being able to join the Union. A number of these requirements concern its relations with Greece. Athens has laid down several markers which the EU is expected to adopt.
These include the demand that it work toward good neighborly relations. It is also likely that Turkey will be encouraged to drop its threat of war (casus belli) over its territorial water dispute with Greece in the Aegean.
The report, sources said, will also demand that Ankara allow the re-opening of the Orthodox Halki seminary located on an island off Istanbul and stop the expropriation of property belonging to Greeks living on the northeastern Aegean islands of Imvros and Tenedos. Ankara will also be asked to make sure that it implements the customs protocol it signed this year and allow the free movement of ships and airplanes between Turkey and Cyprus. It is expected, however, that no mention will be made of deadlines for Ankara to recognize Cyprus.”
http://www.ekathimerini.com/4dcgi/_w_articles_politics_100008_09/11/2005_62807
I’m reading “Salonika: City of Ghosts” currently, a fascinating book about a city that for centuries was one of the most multi-cultural in the world. Greeks, Turks, Bulgarians, Sephardic Jews, and Slavs all rubbed shoulders there from 1492 to 1912. The Greeks took the city in 1912 and Salonika became increasingly more Greek and less diverse especially after the 30,000 Turks left, and 100,000 Anatolian Greeks were settled there during the population exchanges of 1923, and nearly the entire Jewish population of 60,000 was shipped to Aushwitz by the Nazis.
During the Ottoman centuries, Salonika (Thessalonike) was the most important city in Turkish Europe. It had a substantial Turkish population, was a departure point for Muslims making the Haj to Mecca, a staging area for Ottoman operations in the Balkans and the birthplace of both Kemal Attaturk (the “George Washington” of the modern Turkish Republic) and the young Turks who launched him into power.
The point is that just as Orthodox Christians have a connection to Constantinople, the Turks have a connection to Salonika. As a carrot, perhaps the Greeks could offer the Turks a consulate (the house where Kemal Attaturk was born, if its still standing) and a Mosque in Thessalonike in exchange for the reopening of the Halki Seminary and greater freedom for the Patriarchate.
Finishing, “Salonika: City of Ghosts” I learned that Greece gave Turkey a consulate in the house where Kemal Attaturk was born, long ago. Rather than improving relations, however, phony Turkish reports of vandalism against this house were used as a pretext for state-sponsored rioting and violence against the Christians of Constantinople 1955, that was accompanied by murder, rape, assualt and widespread vandalism.
lately, Greece, an early advocate of Turkey’s EU membership bid look like it is beginning to reconsider that support. The Greek Daily Katherimini editorializes today,
“…Turkish intransigence has intensified. The Turkish establishment refuses to tone down its rhetoric. The recent leaks allow the conclusion that certain circles are sending a message not only to Athens and Nicosia but also to the EU.
A number of recent events have reinforced the feeling. National air-space violations have become more aggressive. So has pressure on the Ecumenical Patriarchate in Istanbul. The statements by Turkish officials on the occasion of the proclamation of the breakaway state on northern Cyprus were provocative. Everything seems to point to the fact that Ankara has decided to entrench itself in its fixed positions.
Athens need to shed past illusions and take a sober look at events. So far, Greeceâ??s active support for Turkeyâ??s EU ambitions has yielded no positive results.”
These action follow statements by Turkish PM Tagyp Edorgan, that when Turkey joins the EU, Europe must cease behaving as a “Christian club”, and that Islam and Christianity must have parity in Europe. If Turkey continues to behave this way I’m wondering if it will ever be granted EU membership at all.
I wonder now how quick the rest of the EU will be to bring Turkey since Paris has been burning?
My speculation is there are now second thoughts by many EU members.
Jerry,
Some of the biggest opposition to Turkey joining the EU has come from France, ironically. The French Right has been getting cold feet about this for some time. Again, ironically, the staunchest advocates for Turkey joining the EU are the UK, the United States, and the New European states allied with those two powers. Intersting, isn’t it? Bush battles Muslims in Iraq, but wants to clear the deck for tens of millions of Turkish muslims to enter Europe?
The refusual of the current political establishment in the U.S.whether Republican or Democrat to understand the virulence of Islam will cost this country dearly and Christians here and around the world even more dearly.
Glen,
Part of the push by the US to have the EU include Turkey is the NATO link.
The US is still focusing on a geopolitical military alliance, rather than looking at the socio impact of Turkish participation. It’s not linked to any particular party in America, since both parties have been following the same strategy.
Also you have to consider that part of the military alliance mentality includes Saudi Arabia. The U.S. has tried to follow a policy that tries to separate Islamic groups from governments.
So it has resulted in schizophrenic type policies that support thrusting millions of muslims into the EU. But pursuing and declaring others as terrorists.
Agreed. And yes, it is bi-partisan. The major problem I have is this. The Democratic Party went to war in the Balkans to dismember Serbia. The impact of creating a fundamentalist Albanian-Muslim state is only now being dimly understood. I expected no less, however, since committed Democrats have had a blindspot for Muslims for decades. You can analyze however you will, but the fact of it is clear enough.
However, the most die-hard loyalists of the Bush Administration are those that believe in the idea of a ‘clash of civilizations.’ These folks believe, or are supposed to believe, that Islam represents a clear and present danger and must be confronted.
That’s fine, except that the policies of the Bush Administration do not follow that script. As you said, the policies are schizophrenic. And that makes Bush supporters sound schizo when they try to defend his policies in light of their own philosophy. It becomes clear that they are only trying to defend him because he is a Republican.
For example, Islam is the problem in most Republican’s minds, but according to the Bush Administration ‘Democracy’ will cure all the evils of Muslim society. It is simply not possible, in Bush’s mind, that Democracy would only prove a convenient avenue for Muslim fanatics to take power legally and then introduce the Shari’a.
Muslim domination of Europe is a bad thing in Republican minds, but the Administration believes that Turkey needs to be in the EU, something that will only accelerate the introduction of Muslim rule in France, the UK, and the low countries. Muslim domination of Europe is a bad thing, but according to Bush we need to preserve the Clintonian policies in the Balkans that will create new Muslim states to serve a springboard for the Jihad.
If the Republicans would just stick to their instincts, I believe we’d be okay. However, the folks running the administration seem to be following some kind of bizaare Utopian philosophy centered on the efficacy of ‘democracy’ as the Salvation of the world. A salivific force so powerful, that it can even transform Islam into a Jeffersonian philosophy. I would be happy if Republicans could just wake up, see this for what it is (a pipe dream) and reject it. Good news – after the Miers fiasco, I think that the base of the party is no longer giving Bush the benefit of the doubt. The reflexive support for him because he isn’t a Democrat is now waning. That will allow us to finally, and fully analyze his policies and (hopefully) move past them.
For me the problem is the aggressively nationalistic, militaristic, and xenophobic attitude of the Turkish government which believes it can use crude, bullying tactics and the threat of force and violence to get its way. This attitude, is of course, totally incompatible with the core values of European Union.
The EU requires it’s member states to solve their differences in a peaceful, diplomatic manner, open their borders to citizens and commerce from other EU nations, and be tolerant of minorities. It doesn’t look like the Turkish government is look like it in anywhere near accepting or adopting these these policies.
How can Turkey deny religious freedom to Orthodox Christians even as it seeks religious parity for Muslims in Europe? How can Turkey maintain and occupying force on the soil of one EU nation, Cyprus, and routinely engage in provacative mililtary action against another EU nation, Greece, and be admitted into the EU? Every week squadrons of Turkish aircrafty fly into Greek airspace and engage Greek defense forces in mock dogfights. Turkey may have some legitimate concerns about Greek territorial claims in the Aegean, but does the EU consider this an acceptable manner in which to seek resolution?
I think it’s incorrect and racist to describe all Turks as dangerous, religious fanatics. Kemal Attaturk established a secular state in Turkey and discouraged the Islamic radicalism. Most urban, middle class Turks are western-oriented and secular and it’s only in the villages and towns of the interior, where unemployment is high, that more radical forms of Islam have taken root.
Racially and genetically the Turks had a lot of interaction with their European neighbors over the centuries and it is not very unusual to find blue-eyed Turks, for example. Sufi Islam, the most predominant form of Islam in Turkey, is generally more tolerant of other religions than other Islamic sects. I would speculate that the Turkish hostility towards the Patriarchate is more the result of nationalism (we are all Turks here) and fear of minorities, than it is religion.
Turkish guest workers have been in Germany for decades without creating any serious problems. Turkey itself has the potential to be a rich country with abundant tourism and agricultural export potential, as well as a large low-wage work force. This last item makes me believe that Turkey threatens the other EU nations and their high-wage, socialized and subsidized economies economically, as much as it does culturally.