On the last morning of his time in Turkey, Pope Leo participated in two Orthodox moments of prayer, first with the Armenian Apostolic community and then joining Patriarch Bartholomew for Divine Liturgy (Mass).
The Pope paid tribute to the Armenian people during a prayer service at the Armenian Apostolic Cathedral in Istanbul.
As his predecessors Paul VI (1967), John Paul II (1979) and Benedict XVI (2006) had done, Pope Leo XIV greeted the Armenian Apostolic Church in its cathedral in Istanbul. He was welcomed by the Armenian Patriarch of Constantinople, Sahak II Mashalian, with whom he blessed the assembly in unison.
In his brief message, the head of the Catholic Church paid tribute to the past sufferings of the Armenians. As expected, he did not use the term "genocide" to describe the persecution of Armenians between 1915 and 1923 on the territory of present-day Turkey, and only hinted at this painful past.
"This visit provides me with the opportunity to thank God for the courageous Christian witness of the Armenian people throughout history, often amid tragic circumstances," he said.
In 2001, Pope John Paul II caused diplomatic tension with Turkey by recognizing the Armenian genocide in a statement co-signed with Armenian Patriarch Garegin II.
Then in 2015, Pope Francis quoted John Paul II's statement during a Mass celebrated for the centenary of the massacre. Turkey reacted immediately by recalling its ambassador for consultation. In 2015, during his visit to Armenia, the Argentine pontiff referred to the massacres perpetrated under the Ottoman Empire using the term "genocide."
The situation of Armenians in Turkey remains delicate. Yesterday, during the Pope's only public Mass in Istanbul, some Armenian Catholic faithful made no secret of the fact that the term "genocide" was a "dangerous" word.
The desire for Christian unity
In his message, Leo XIV also reiterated the purpose of his trip to Turkey: to commemorate the 1,700th anniversary of the Council of Nicaea:
We must draw from this shared apostolic faith in order to recover the unity that existed in the early centuries between the Church of Rome and the ancient Oriental Churches. We must also take inspiration from the experience of the early Church in order to restore full communion, a communion which does not imply absorption or domination, but rather an exchange of the gifts received by our Churches from the Holy Spirit for the glory of God the Father and the edification of the body of Christ.
At the end of his visit, the Pope blessed a commemorative plaque engraved with the dates of the Popes' visits to the site.
“We are the largest Christian community in Türkiye, so to welcome the Pope in our Church is very significant for us,” Dr. Drtad Uzunyan, Archpriest and Member of the religious council, told Vatican News.
“I hope this will bring an even closer ecumenical relationship between the two Churches. It is already very good, but I hope that it will increase in the future.”
He remembered that, although Pope Leo XIV is the fourth Pope to come to the Cathedral—after Paul VI, John Paul II, and Benedict XIV — in 2014, Pope Francis visited the Armenian Patriarch at the time, who was sick in the hospital in Istanbul.
“So Pope Leo is the fourth Pope in the Cathedral but fifth Pope with the Armenian community,” Archpriest Uzunyan said, smiling.
Divine Liturgy
Leo then went to St. George's Church to participate in the "Divine Liturgy" (Mass) of the Orthodox Patriarchate of Constantinople. The Liturgy marked the feast of St. Andrew who is the patron of the Orthodox. Bartholomew is counted as his 270th successor.
Alongside Patriarch Bartholomew I, the Pope called on Catholics and Orthodox Christians to face together the "threats" of wars, the climate crisis, and the challenge of technological advances.
As has been the case for the past years, these elements of common concern give the Churches ample spaces for working together.
The Holy Father also assured that continuing to work for full communion is a priority for him and for the Roman Catholic Church.
He mentioned the work of the Joint International Commission for Theological Dialogue between the Catholic Church and the Orthodox Church, which was established following the rapprochement between Paul VI and Patriarch Athenagoras, who lifted the mutual excommunications of 1054 between the two Churches.
He encouraged the Patriarch of Constantinople, considered the primate of the Orthodox, to "make every effort to ensure that all autocephalous Orthodox Churches resume active participation in this commitment." The Orthodox world is itself divided, notably with the break in communion between Constantinople and Moscow since 2018.
The Pope affirmed:
For my part, in continuity with the teaching of the Second Vatican Council and my predecessors, I wish to confirm that, while respecting legitimate differences, the pursuit of full communion among all those baptized in the name of the Father, and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, is one of the priorities of the Catholic Church. In particular, it is one of the priorities of my ministry as Bishop of Rome, whose specific role in the universal Church is to be at the service of all, building and safeguarding communion and unity.
After the liturgy, which lasted more than two hours, the Pope and the Patriarch gave a joint ecumenical blessing from the balcony of the Patriarchate.
Leo XIV went on to have a private lunch with his host before heading to the airport to travel to Lebanon, the second stop on his apostolic journey.
