The dual message of the pope’s visit to Turkey
ISTANBUL – Yet another papal trip, and possibly the one most discussed, has come to a successful conclusion. Pope Benedict XVI, who was reserved throughout his visit to Turkey, achieved his goal of expressing the respect and fraternal love of the Catholic Church upon a visit to the leading seat of Orthodoxy, the Ecumenical Patriarchate. At the same time, regardless of the pressure of circumstances, he emphasized his interest in the need for communication with Islam, though the Turkish Sunni version of a worldly and state-approved Islam is an example to be avoided, to say the very least, in the eyes of a significant proportion of the Muslim and Arab world. An initial assessment of the papal visit reveals satisfaction on all sides – the Ecumenical Patriarchate, the Vatican and the Turkish government of Recep Tayyip Erdogan.
