Liturgy in Holy Cross Church proved Armenians of Istanbul have not changed for 95 years

PanARMENIAN.Net - With an enviable masochism and with almost a reverence, a number of Armenian media sources successfully replaced the Turkish ones, enthusiastically describing the meetings in Van and the liturgy itself. Probably, they sincerely believed they were performing their professional duties. In fact, no one argues, but there must be a limit to everything, and in this case it would be sensible to follow the example of the Turkish media, which limited itself to the mere statement of the fact and wrote the same things as before the liturgy. Certain representatives of St. Echmiadzin acted quite like the Armenian press too.

“Declaring that holding a liturgy in the church Holy Cross on Akhtamar Island is just another show of Turkey, Armenia has turned this issue into a subject of speculation,” at a press conference in Yerevan said Archimandrite of Ararat Diocese of the Armenian Apostolic Church, Komitas Hovnanian. Moreover, the archimandrite considers it wrong that the Armenians should not have taken part in the liturgy.

In his revelations the Holy Father went even further, saying that it was exactly Armenia that achieved conduct of a liturgy in the Curch of Holy Cross. It would be difficult to think up a better absurdity. Simply Turkey decided that it was necessary and she did it. And on the whole, it is all the same for the Government of this country how many Armenians were present - 100 or 10 thousand. The most important point is that the liturgy was held, giving Ankara a bargaining chip in the negotiations, in the EU, and finally in the USA. Only a very limited person for whom the world ends at the threshold of his house would not notice it. Again unfortunately, so it is for the majority of the clergymen of the Armenian Apostolic Church. The only thing that Echmiadzin proved to be capable of was the refusal to participate in the liturgy. Even so, it can be assumed that this decision was made after the boycott of Catholicos of the Great House of Cilicia, Aram I. And surprisingly the cold attitude of Turkey to this action, which can hardly be called a liturgy, did not put anyone to their guard. The Armenians of Istanbul obviously expected some high-ranking official from Ankara, but no one came, apart from the administration of the Vilayet of Van. And why should there be? The church is restored, UNESCO and the world are satisfied or pretend to be satisfied. What else is necessary? But nobody learnt that the road to the church is lined with broken khachkars (stone-crosses), graves of priests are desecrated and the entire monastery complex, except for the church remained in ruins and no one will ever think of recover it. Not to mention thousands of destroyed and desecrated temples.

The last Archbishop of the Armenian Patriarchate of Constantinople before the World War I, Maghakia Ormanian, still in 1913 warned his congregation about the danger and untrustworthiness of the Ottomans. The congregation, alas, would not listen to reason of late. We witnessed the awful results - half a million killed, half a million scattered. And how many were forcibly expelled! Their descendants now suddenly “recovered their sight” and began to talk about their Armenian roots. And we, the residents of Armenia, almost with tenderness begin to talk about some Turkish leader, claiming he is actually an Armenian, and not a Turk. Who do we deceive and why is a rhetorical question.

The danger of what happened on September19 is that Turkey might turn a couple of more churches into a museum, allow divine services there and then with a clear conscience pursue the policy of denying the Armenian Genocide. And we have no doubt that things will go exactly that way...

Generally it must be said that the Armenians still live on myths about Turkey as a state and the Armenian community of Istanbul. In particular, the community is presented as a hostage in the hands of the Turkish state, although this is true only partially. In fact, the Armenians of Istanbul do not live so badly, the main thing for them to remember is not to stand out from the Ottoman mass. And we must admit that this community, formerly led by Archbishop Mesrop Mutafyan, and now by Aram Ateshyan, has so far been doing it quite successfully. The logic is simple – we’ll sit still and nothing will happen. The Istanbul Armenians never learned the lesson of 1915, and the proof of it is the murder of Hrant Dink, the threats against the patriarch and common members of the community. It comes down to the fact that editor of the Zhamanak daily Ara Kochunyan does not use the term “genocide” in the pages of his publications... In this regard, very remarkable are the words of Armenian poet, MP Grigor Zohrap in the night of 23 - 24 of April 1915. When he was told that he must escape since a massacre was ahead, he replied: “Really? The Turks are our friends. Yesterday I was playing backgammon with Talat, he would have told me...”. 95 years has passed since then and nothing has changed: all the Armenians are naive and believe in the power of applications, letters, protests; the Turks continue their policy of eradication of ermenimilliyet. It will always be so, until we have priests like Archimandrite Hovnanian and pastors like the Patriarch of Constantinople.