THANKSGIVING LETTER
OF HIS ALL-HOLINESS ECUMENICAL PATRIARCH BARTHOLOMEW
for the Support Expressed to the Mother Church of Constantinople
on the Occasion of the Conversion of Hagia Sophia into a Mosque
We hasten to offer our sincere gratitude for your letter, wherein is expressed your deep sorrow for the decision recently taken by the Turkish authorities to convert the museum of Hagia Sophia into a mosque.
The edifice of a Christian church constitutes an insurmountable theological language, which, by architectural inspiration, rightly proclaims the faith of the Church in the Triune God, in the all-saving incarnation of God the Word and in the eschatological fulfilment and fullness of the Divine Oikonomia in the Kingdom of God.