Pope ‘deeply pained’ over Turkey’s conversion of Hagia Sophia from museum to mosque

VATICAN CITY â€”  Pope Francis says he is “deeply painedâ€� over the decision by Turkey’s president to change the status of Hagia Sophia — which was originally built in Istanbul as a Christian cathedral — from a museum to a mosque.

In a brief improvised remark, Francis noted that the Roman Catholic Church marked Sunday as International Day of the Sea. “And the sea brings me a little far away with my thought, to Istanbul,� the pontiff said, speaking from his studio window overlooking St. Peter’s Square. “I am thinking of St. Sophia and I am deeply pained.�

Francis said no more but was clearly referring to the move by Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan to formally convert the monumental building back into a mosque.

The colossal Santa Sophia cathedral, an iconic structure that now attracts visitors from the world over, was turned from a place of Christian worship into a mosque after the Ottomans conquered the city in 1453. The Turkish secular government in 1934 decided to make it a museum.

The European Union also criticized the decision to turn the building into a mosque. “When I see now what is happening with Hagia Sophia, that is a blow,� Luxembourg Foreign Minister Jean Asselborn said at a meeting Monday of the bloc’s top diplomats.

The pope and the EU added their voices to strong objections by the head of the Geneva-based World Council of Churches. That organization described its “grief and dismay� in noting that Hagia Sophia has been “a place of openness, encounter and inspiration for people from all nations.� The council’s membership comprises Protestant, Orthodox and Anglican churches.

Erdogan, who counts many observant Muslims as supporters, declared the monument open for Muslim worship last Friday after a high court annulled the 1934 government decision.