The Halki Seminary and Religious Freedom in Turkey

The Rising Influence of the Ecumenical Patriarchate

Along with its status and mission, the institution referred to in Turkey’s official discourse as the “Fener Greek Patriarchate,” but internationally recognized under its proper name, the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople, has been gaining ever greater significance and influence in Turkey’s relations with the United States. In recent years, the Ecumenical Patriarchate in Istanbul and its spiritual leader, His All-Holiness Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, have even attracted more attention than the President of Turkey himself.

U.S.–Patriarchate Relations

In November 2020, during his Middle East tour, former U.S. Secretary of State Mike Pompeo visited Istanbul, where he deliberately refrained from meeting with any Turkish officials and instead went directly to the Patriarchate to meet with Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew. Their November 17 meeting addressed the state of religious freedom in Turkey, as well as the condition and treatment of Christians in Turkey and across the Middle East.

When Joe Biden was elected President of the United States, he did not forget Patriarch Bartholomew in responding to congratulatory messages. Even before replying to President Erdoğan’s congratulations, Biden personally answered Bartholomew’s message with a letter. His eventual response to Erdoğan came in a phone call during which he also announced his intention to recognize the genocide committed against the Armenians—a promise later fulfilled when the Biden administration officially recognized the 1915 massacres as “genocide.”

Biden had previously visited the Patriarchate in 2011, where he naturally addressed Bartholomew with the title “Ecumenical.” Likewise, when the Patriarch has addressed the White House, he has consistently been introduced and recognized with his ecumenical title. The use of this designation carries the potential to become yet another point of contention in U.S.–Turkey relations.

Religious Freedom Concerns in U.S. Reports

In America’s dealings with the Patriarchate, it is to be expected that issues highlighted in reports by the U.S. Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) will remain on the agenda. These include the reconversion of Hagia Sophia into a mosque, attacks on churches and cemeteries, mistreatment of non-Muslim minorities, the widespread use of hate speech, the ongoing closure of the Halki Seminary, attacks on clergy of the “People of the Book,” and broader questions regarding the protection of Christian rights and population.

What is certain is that all of these problems—and indeed more—exist in Turkey today. If we take the Tanzimat era as a starting point, these issues have been on the agenda for nearly two centuries. Yet Turkey has consistently chosen not to resolve them of its own accord and in a manner consistent with human dignity. Instead, unresolved domestic questions have become international disputes, paving the way for outside political and even military interventions.

The Byzantine Legacy of State Control

Turkey appears determined to perpetuate a Byzantine political tradition of keeping religion and clergy under absolute state control. On one hand, it regulates all Sunni institutions through the Directorate of Religious Affairs (Diyanet); on the other, it denies millions of Alevis basic religious freedoms. The state not only refuses to recognize Alevis’ right to self-identification but also attempts, through the Diyanet, to reshape Alevi belief into a state-defined model of Islam. Similarly, the Ecumenical Patriarch—recognized globally as the spiritual leader of hundreds of millions of Orthodox Christians—is persistently treated as though he were no more than a local mufti under the authority of the Eyüp district governor.

The protection of Turkey’s remaining Christian population has therefore become a central issue both for the Church and for the United States.

Demographic Transformations

In 1877, the Ottoman Parliament (Meclis-i Mebusan) included 33 Muslim deputies and 22 Christian deputies elected from districts within today’s Turkish borders. The Christian population was not confined to a single region but spread across the country, enabling Christian communities everywhere to elect their own representatives. At that time, roughly 60 percent of the population was Muslim and 40 percent non-Muslim. Census data from 1844 confirms these figures: despite the independence of largely Christian regions such as Hungary, Transylvania, Vojvodina, Greece, and Georgia, the Ottoman territories still comprised a population that was 41 percent Christian and 58 percent Muslim.

From the late Ottoman autocratic period onward, large demographic shifts occurred. As Muslim populations fled lost territories into Anatolia, state repression and popular hostility accelerated the exodus of non-Muslims. By 1914, the Christian share of the population had dropped from 40 percent to 20 percent. Between 1914 and 1924, a far greater demographic catastrophe took place: the remaining 20 percent Christian population was reduced to just 2 percent within a decade. Turkey thus began to acquire a religiously homogeneous structure.

This process did not end with the 1924 population exchange. While remnants of the Greek population were forcibly Islamized, systematic pressures drove many other non-Muslims to flee. In 1935, pogroms in Thrace drove out the Jewish population; in 1942, the Wealth Tax confiscated the property of non-Muslim elites; in 1955, the September 6–7 Pogrom targeted Greeks, Armenians, and Jews once again. Feeling unsafe, these communities gradually left their homeland, leading to a brain drain, a loss of capital, and the overall impoverishment of society.

Even when large-scale events subsided, pressure on non-Muslims never fully disappeared. Today, systematic attacks continue. For example, the deliberate neglect and eventual demolition of the Greek Orthodox Church of Saint George in Bursa exemplifies ongoing patterns of discrimination.

Contemporary Challenges and Hate Rhetoric

Meanwhile, failures in foreign policy are reflected in the rhetoric of government leaders, where hate speech has become commonplace. In the wake of the massacres in Gaza, not only Jews but also Christians have been scapegoated for alleged Western support of Israel. Pro-government media now openly incite hostility toward both the United States and Christians, invoking the specter of a new Crusade.

On September 25, 2025, President Trump, during a White House meeting with President Erdoğan, demanded the reopening of the Halki Seminary. It would be unrealistic to expect such a demand to go unanswered. Yet religious freedom in Turkey cannot be reduced to the issue of Halki alone. Should President Trump approach the matter comprehensively—framing religious freedom as an inseparable component of Turkey’s democratic development—this would undoubtedly contribute to the democratization of NATO-member Turkey.