On the occasion of the Day of Prayer for the Unity of the Churches, an inter-church prayer ceremony was held at the Ayia Triada Greek Church in Taksim on Friday, January 21, at 06:00 pm.
Deputy Patriarch Senior Father Krikor Damadyan attended the ceremony, presided over by the Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, on behalf of His Beatitude Patriarch Sahak II. Father Natan Arabian, Father Nerses Ayvazyan and Astdiakos Arda Pınarcıyan also attended the ceremony.
The clergy entered the church with a parade, with bells and hymns sung by the Greek Church readers. The ceremony began with the prayer of the Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew. Members of the Armash Choir under the direction of Diakos Edvin Galipyan by the Armenian Church sang the hymn “Surp Asdvadz”.
In addition to the clergy of the Greek Church, representatives of Syriac, Latin Catholic, Armenian Catholic churches and Kitap-ı Mukaddes Company attended. A small number of believers also attended the ceremony, which took place under the conditions of the pandemic.
After the Bible passages read by fellow church members, Patriarch Bartholomew preached and reminded that the central theme of this year’s ceremony is the Bible verse, “We saw the star in the East, and we came to worship it” (Matthew 2:2). He stated that the light of the world is Christ (John 8:12) and that He is the true light that illuminates humanity (John 1:9) and that Christian believers are the light of the world with their faith (Matthew 5:14).
At the end of the sermon, the representatives of the churches lit candles from the oil lamp on the right side of the Church, while the Iznik Credo was recited in Georgian. This symbolic ceremony represented being illuminated by the light of the world and illuminating the world with that light.
After the Lord’s prayer, which the participants recited in their mother tongue, the ceremony ended with the blessing of the Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew.
