That tiny church in Anatolia

In the synagogue the Torah is read in Greek, in the Greek church the prayers are in Arabic. Turkish is used in the Catholic church and at Christmas Mass it is not unusual to see girls wearing the veil in church. The spirit of coexistence is real, but was not enough to stay the hand of Murat Altun, who on 3 June 2010 killed Bishop Luigi Padovese, the Vicar Apostolic of Anatolia, strongly committed to interfaith dialogue. The court in Iskenderun sentenced Murat to fifteen years in prison. Father Domenico Bertogli is a Capuchin friar from the Emilia region of Italy who has lived for 45 years in Turkey, first in Smyrna and then, since 1987, as parish priest at the church of S. Pietro & S. Paolo in Antioch. «Bishop Padovese’s death is a real tragedy, not only for the Christian community in Anatolia, but for Turkey as a whole – he said -. I knew him well, working for him as vicar general; he was a quiet man, always smiling, and friendly with everybody, which makes his death even more inexplicable».

What has changed in the many years that you have worked in Turkey, Father?  

«Things have moved on a lot. I think tourism has been an important factor. Then there is Turkey’s desire to become part of Europe, which has opened many doors. These days there is much willingness to join in dialogue, to engage with the “other”, with people who are different, which is the way Christians are seen. Antioch has become a model of coexistence with the setting-up of the “Civilization Choir of Antakya”. Sunni and Alawite Muslims, Greek Orthodox Christians, Catholic Christians, Armenian Christians and Jews sing the praises of God together: a message of brotherly love and mutual respect between the different creeds. In this way we discover that before being Muslims or Christians, we are human beings, God’s creatures, that we need to respect each other and work together for the benefit of the human race and peace in the world».

In Antioch, ecumenism is also applied to buildings, in fact Father Domenico’s church is next to the Orthodox church and behind it is the mosque.

«Ecumenism is not an option here but a necessity. We are in a predominantly Muslim quarter, but there have never been problems. I go to the Orthodox church every Sunday and we celebrate Easter on the same date. We have even opened a Caritas office with them to collaborate on charitable projects. It is more urgent than ever for Christians to rediscover the unity which makes them a sign to the world, if they want to be credible».

CHRISTIANS, A LIVELY MINORITY

Antioch is only fifty kilometres from the Syrian border and not more than a hundred kilometres from Aleppo. It has a population of 200,000. There are 1,000 Christians, almost all of them Arabic-speaking Greek Orthodox, whose religious leader is the Greek Orthodox patriarch of Antioch (who lives in Damascus). There are about seventy Catholics. Since 2000 there has been a Korean Presbyterian church with a small group of faithful, as well as other free churches with various believers, mainly from the Islamic world. The Catholic church in Turkey is made up of three ecclesiastical jurisdictions of Latin rite: the diocese of Smyrna with more than 1,300 faithful, the apostolic vicariate of Istanbul with 15,000 faithful and the apostolic vicariate of Anatolia with about 4,500. The last of these is Fr. Bertogli’s district. He lives in Antioch; the other people working in the vicariate are: three priests and one friar at Iskenderun, two priests and one friar at Mersin, one priest at Adana, one on the Black Sea and three nuns at Tarsus, of the congregation of the Daughters of the Church. The contribution from the laity is minimal precisely because there are so few Christians. 138 groups of pilgrims passed through in 2012, from all over the world, as well as numerous groups from other areas of Turkey. In addition there are film directors, ambassadors, journalists, archaeologists, politicians and students. In Antioch, fifty percent of the Muslims are Sunni, the other half are Alawites. The increase in the number of Sunnis, due to the arrival of Syrian refugees fleeing from the war against the Assad regime, may well create tensions.

© 2013 – Romina Gobbo

published on Famiglia Cristiana – 3 february 2013