The old Church of the Savior of Chora in Constantinople which had been a museum is set to be converted into a Mosque once again. The Erdogan government has again demonstrated its extremism. This is the same Erdogan that Prime Minister Mitsotakis invited to Athens a short time ago.
The Chora Church features beautiful iconography. We will be losing them, as eventually the Turks will destroy the iconography of Hagia Sophia. Sadly, the heritage of Greek Orthodoxy in Constantinople is being lost.
The Ecumenical Patriarchate to whom both the Chora Church and Hagia Sophia theoretically belong is itself acting like its Turkish oppressors in Ukraine where the Great Lavra a great source of Russian and Ukrainian spirituality is being taken from the Ukrainian Orthodox Church. Another cleric of the Ukrainian Orthodox Church, Metropolitan Longin has been beaten. The Ecumenical Patriarch in his expansionist activities is losing what is in theory, rightfully his.
In the end, he will end up with nothing. The conversion of the Chora Church is serious, but considering the persecution of the Church in Ukraine, few outside the Greek speaking world will care. The Greek government itself is more preoccupied with feuding with the Church of Greece over gay marriage than defending one of Greek Orthodoxy’s great Churches.
The conversion of the Chora Church demonstrates the failure of the policies of both Patriarch and Prime Minister. The Americans with whom the Patriarch collaborated in his anti Russian policies in Ukraine are predictably not helping him in Turkey.
As for the Prime Minister, his appeasement of Erdogan has been answered with the conversion of the Chora Church. The conversions of Chora and Hagia Sophia are outrageous insults to Christianity and Hellenism but the Greek world remains asleep despite these insults.