Churched

I was afraid that I would not recognize Engin on our way to meeting him. It had been at least 10 months since we had sat in the Erb's house over tea and talked about this place. Now I was walking down an Istanbul street (some say the Istanbul street), Istiklal Caddesi, going to meet him. Engin is the priest at perhaps the only Turkish speaking Anglican church in the world. We have made plans to meet him outside of the Swedish consulate, where the church used to gather in a little white chapel surrounded, as all good consulates worth their salt are, by a twenty foot tall spiked wall. It would be an imposing structure if the whole city weren't full of them, and itself one for that matter. After a few minutes of waiting a man came walking up with a boy of about thirteen, this was Engin. I was quite sure of it. Encouraged by my ability of memory, and of Landon already waiving, I waived to him. It was wonderful to meet him in his place and even as an outsider himself (a Turkish born Muslim/Christian convert) he seemed at home. As we walk from the Swedish consulate Engin pointed out other christian churches. Over here was one that is in terrible disrepair. Over there was the ex-patriot church with English services (one we plan on checking out). There are not many Christian churches in Istanbul, or in all of Turkey for that matter, but many seem to be quite close together. We were walking back the way we had come. Soon it became clear that we would probably end up quite close to our apartment. Turns out that the nice church steeple I had been taking pictures of right outside my window is the Armenian church building they meet in. It is less than fifty steps from our front door (although probably more than fifty steps if you include the 5 flights of stairs we have to descend to get to our front door). The service was great, or so I'm led to believe. It was all in Turkish so there wasn't much I was able to pick up. Everyone there was very friendly, and we were even able to enlist the help of a fellow ex-pat in getting cell phones and transit passes tomorrow. I am excited to have a church. I got a sense of community there, something larger than our little group. I hope to get to know them in some small way this year. To engage them in conversation and participate for a short while in their community.