Byzantine Church Transformed into Mosque
St. Sophia in Istanbul has been transformed into a mosque for Ramadan.
From June 6 to July 5, 2016, in other words, during the Muslim observance of Ramadan, the Koran is read every day in the former basilica of St. Sophia in Istanbul. The State’s religious TV channel broadcasts this morning prayer live before the day’s fast.
According to a posting from June 15, 2016 on the website Boulevard Voltaire, “this initiative is considered in Turkey as an answer to the recognition of the Armenian genocide by Germany.” A deputy of the ruling party (AKP – Justice and Development Party) clearly justified it on Twitter:
The United States are helping the Kurd Workers’ Party and Germany is clinging to their lies on the genocide, there is no more friendship. In return, St. Sophia must remain open for prayers.”
This same deputy requests that the former basilica be transformed into a mosque definitively,
for the western Christians are no longer friends of the Turks, and we must no longer take them into consideration!”
Ever since the AKP came to power in 2002, a possible reconversion of St. Sophia has been discussed regularly.
A jewel of Byzantine Christian architecture, a major work built in the 6 th century and included on UNESCO’s World Heritage List, St. Sophia was converted into a mosque after the taking of Constantinople by the Ottoman Turks in 1453. St. Sophia was then transformed into a museum in 1943 at the initiative of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, then head of the young Republic of Turkey, which claimed to be secular.
Source: DICI no. 338 - July 1, 2016
