Papal mission to Istanbul

A THREE-MAN mission from the Holy See returned to Rome at the weekend after a four-day visit to Istanbul "to renew and continue the contacts already begun" between Pope Paul and the Orthodox Ecumenical Patriarch Athenagoras.
According to the Vatican Secretariat for Christian Unity, they also visited the head of the Gregorian Armenian Church in Turkey, Patriarch Snork Kalustian.
Members of the mission were Archbishop Martin of Rouen, Mgr. Jan Willehrands, and Fr. Pierre Duprey.
According to reports in an Australian Catholic paper. The Record, sent by a correspondent in Istanbul, the Patriarch has not been granting audiences for some weeks. and is believed to be seriously ill. One version is that he is suffering from leukaemia.
Persecution
The visit came at a time when the Orthodox Patriarchate is being harassed by the Turkish government, which seems to be taking reprisals against the Greek Orthodox for Archbishop Makarios's activities in Cyprus. The Church in Cyprus, however, is autonomous, and not under the Patriarch's jurisdiction.
Following the recent expulsion from Turkey of two Metropolitans closely associated with the Patriarch's work, the World Council of Churches has interceded with the Turkish government, asking that the Patriarchate he given freedom to carry out its task.
The message to Turkey's Foreign Minister Feredun Cemal Erkin, was signed by the Rev. Franklin Clark Fry of New York. chairman of the WCC ceatral committee, and by the general secretary, the Rev. W. A. Visser 't Hooft.
Reports in Athens say that the Turkish government plans to demolish the Patriarchate's headquarters in order to build a new highway. The Greek government has formally accused Turkey of persecution, and has asked six nations, including Britain, to intervene.