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The Armenian Genocide is commemorated on April 24 each year, the Pontian Greek Genocide on May 19. Together with the Assyrians and other Christians under Ottoman rule, the combined total of Orthodox and Eastern Christians massacred by the Muslim Turks from 1894 to 1923 reached 3.6 million. Still from the film 'Ravished Armenia', based on a survivor's eyewitness account. While it is essential to remember the Armenian Genocide and to work to stop the Islamic genocide against Christians in the Middle East and Africa being committed today, we must recall that the term 'genocide' is a secular one. As Christians we commemorate those killed not so much as 'genocide victims', but as Martyrs — Witnesses for Christ — for they were persecuted and killed by the Turkish Muslims primarily because they were Christians, who refused to renounce their faith in Jesus Christ. As the Lord tells us, "You will be hated by all for My Name's sake. But he who endures to th...

Islamic supremacism ratchets up its already relentless jihad against the tiny Christian remnant in Turkey.  According to government reports cited by Wikipedia, Islam makes up between 96.4% and 99.8% of Turkey's population, with a tiny fraction ( less than 0.2%) being Christian . The Christians in Turkey are being hounded to oblivion, as can be seen by the shocking decline of their population just over the last hundred years: The percentage of Christians in Turkey fell from 19% (or perhaps as high as 25% of the population of 16 million) in 1914 to 7% percent in 1927, due to events which had a significant impact on the country's demographic structure, such as the Armenian Genocide ... and the  Istanbul pogrom of 6–7 September 1955. There were 236 churches in Turkey as of approximately five years ago, with at least nine churches named Hagia Sophia turned into mosques since then, and now 50 more churches and monasteries closed. That is a reduction in places of worship of 25%...

Islamic prayers were recently held at the Hagia Sophia in former Constantinople in a televised event attended by Turkish officials and strongly condemned by the Greek Foreign Ministry.  This is yet another highly symbolic event inked to this great and ancient church building, which we Orthodox Christians must respond to... There has been a growing movement within Turkey for several years demanding the re-conversion into a mosque of Hagia Sophia — for centuries the greatest church in all of Christendom. The great church was turned into a mosque in 1453 after the Muslim Turks conquered Constantinople and subjugated the surviving Christian inhabitants. Following the defeat of the Ottoman empire in World War I, the new leader of the secular state of Turkey, Kemal Ataturk, in 1935 put a stop to Islamic prayers in Hagia Sophia, and had it converted into a museum. Ever since Recep Tayyip Erdogan came to power in Turkey in 2003, calls for turning Hagia Sophia back into a functioning mosque...

May 29 is the anniversary of the defeat of Constantinople in 1453 by the Ottoman Muslims. This fine documentary, scripted and hosted by Archimandrite Tikhon (Shevkunov), Abbot of Sretensky Monastery in Moscow, presents a uniquely Russian Orthodox perspective on the history and fall of Byzantium, and the lessons to be drawn from the world's greatest and longest-enduring empire. h/t to Fr Thomas Soroka

"The great doors of Saint Sophia were forced open, and crowds of angry soldiers came in and fell upon the unfortunate worshippers. Pillaging and killing in the holy place went on for hours. Similar was the fate of worshippers in most churches in the city..." by Dionysios Hatzopoulos, Romiosini : In the city everyone realized that the fateful moment had come. In the city, while the bells of the churches rang mournfully, citizens and soldiers joined a long procession behind the holy relics brought out of the churches. Singing hymns, men, women, children, soldiers, civilians, clergy, monks and nuns, knowing that they were going to die shortly, made peace with themselves, with God and with eternity. When the procession ended the Emperor met with his commanders and the notables of the city. In a philosophical speech he told his subjects that the end of their time had come. In essence he told them that Man had to be ready to face death when he had to fight for his faith, for his co...