Pope to visit Turkey in November, first trip to a Muslim nation

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Pope Francis will visit the Turkish city of İstanbul at the end of November, his first trip to a predominantly Muslim nation, the Vatican said on Friday.

Vatican spokesman Father Federico Lombardi said the exact dates and the program for the trip, which will last several days, were still not fixed.

Francis is expected to be in İstanbul on Nov. 30, the feast of St. Andrew, at the invitation of Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I, spiritual head of the world’s Orthodox Christians.

The Vatican confirmed the trip after the pope accepted a separate invitation from the Turkish government.

The Vatican was recently criticized by Mehmet Görmez, head of Turkey’s Religious Affairs Directorate, for remaining ineffective in preventing attacks against Muslims.

Referring to a ceremony during which Pope Francis washed and kissed the feet of two young Muslim women at a juvenile detention center as part of the Holy Thursday ritual in March 2013, Görmez said: “This [preventing attacks on Islam] cannot be accomplished by just washing the feet of a young lady or organizing an interfaith football match or tournament. … It is necessary to prevent discriminative actions targeting the members of such a holy religion as Islam. The Religious Affairs Directorate also has many responsibilities [to fulfill] in this regard.”

Former Pope Benedict XVI made a trip to İstanbul in 2006 and prayed with a Muslim cleric in the famed Blue Mosque.

Francis, the first non-European pope in 1,300 years, has made three trips abroad since his election in March 2013.

He is due to visit Albania next week and on Nov. 25 he will address the European Parliament in Strasbourg, France. Martin Schulz, president of the parliament, said on Thursday that the pope would address the assembled legislators. The Vatican confirmed the date for the visit.

source: todayszaman

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