Archaeologist Mustafa Sahin has spent nearly a decade working at Lake Iznik, tucked between rolling hills in western Turkey.
The excavations he is leading at the relatively unknown site point to one of the most important events in Christian history. Its fame will rise after Pope Leo visits on Friday, as part of his first overseas visit since his election in May.
“Of course, the fact that it is recognised worldwide and that Pope Leo XIV, one of the most prominent religious leaders in Christianity, will visit this place makes me very proud and very happy,” Mr Sahin, of Bursa Uludag University, told The National.
It is 1,700 years since hundreds of bishops from across the Roman Empire convened in Iznik, also known as Nicaea, for a meeting to settle a major dispute in Christian belief.
The most significant outcome was the Nicene Creed – a proclamation that Jesus is equal to God the Father. In a slightly modified form, it is still recited in church services around the world, across most denominations.
It is a profession of faith that “unites all Christians”, Pope Leo XIV wrote in a papal letter published on Sunday. “In these difficult times we are living, amid so many concerns and fears, threats of war and violence, natural disasters, grave injustices and imbalances, and the hunger and misery suffered by millions of our brothers and sisters, this creed gives us hope.”
Prof Sahin believes that the council meeting in AD325 took place at the archaeological site, now on the shores of Lake Iznik.
Originally spotted in aerial photography in 2014, the site was underwater for years until Lake Iznik’s levels receded, revealing the ruins of the Basilica of Saint Neophytos, a local holy man.
“When we first started digging here, we thought that it was the Church of St Neophytos of Iznik, who was martyred at the age of 16, but we always had a question mark in our minds. Why would they build such a big church for a saint?” Prof Sahin said.
A fresco in the Vatican’s Sistine Chapel suggested the St Neophytos Church, later destroyed in an earthquake, was built on the site where the Council of Nicaea had taken place.
“In the upper left corner of the fresco of the council, it showed that the place where the meeting was held was by the lake outside the city walls,” he added.
Archaeologists have also uncovered coins, pilgrims’ belongings and human skeletons at the site, where Turkey’s Ministry of Culture and Tourism and the provincial municipality have funded excavations.
Pope Leo will lead prayers at the archaeological site on Friday as part of his four-day visit to Turkey which begins the day before.
His schedule also includes a welcome by President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, a meeting with Bartholomew I, the spiritual leader of Eastern Orthodox Christians. Leo will lead a mass at a stadium in Istanbul, the first by a pope outside a cathedral in Turkey. He will then head to Lebanon. Pope Leo’s predecessor, Pope Francis, had intended to make the trip to Turkey, but became ill, and died in April.
A town of 45,000 residents, surrounded by the remains of Byzantine city walls, Iznik is today renowned as a production centre for high quality ceramics. Shops selling intricate pieces in rich shades of royal blue and forest green line a main thoroughfare, while elderly residents wrapped up in woolly jumpers rest on benches in the milky winter sun.
In this Muslim-majority town, a few hours’ drive from Istanbul, many people are excited about the prospect of the Pope’s visit.
Bekir Uslu, 53, who owns a tea garden, is among the many Turks outraged by the situation in Gaza who believe that spiritual leaders need to play a role in ending global conflicts.
“Faith leaders are, as you know, people with high spirituality,” he said. “I think these wars will end wherever these people have a hand.”
Iznik’s tile production industry is influencing the gifts that residents have prepared for the Pope.
Mesude Kunen, 52, belongs to the third generation of a family of ceramic artisans in the town. She has spent a month and a half making a hand-printed 3D terracotta model of Iznik, which she hopes to present to Pope Leo.
“I just felt like giving a gift, to promote Iznik,” she said, as she pointed out landmarks on her creation, including the city walls, Roman theatre and a madrassa. Religion was not an important deciding factor for offering the gift to the leader of the Catholic world. “Everyone’s belief is their own. The God we believe in is only one anyway,” she said.
If she cannot present the tile gift to the pontiff – she recognises that Iznik will be a high-security zone during his visit – she plans to reach out to diplomatic missions to get it to him. “I’ll get it to them somehow. That’s the plan,” she said.
German citizen Manfred Schmid, 63, moved to Iznik 15 years ago and runs an organisation that sells local olive woodwork. His colleague Ferhat Cetin, 44, has carved a frame for a tile painting of the Council of Nicaea to present to the Pope. Mr Schmid has also prepared caps in vibrant shades of blue and red, bearing the words, “Light from Light, 1,700 Years, Council of Nicaea”. Crosses and Christmas decorations adorn his shop.
Some residents blamed the conversion of the Hagia Sophia, a local former church and museum, into a mosque in 2011 for a large drop in visitor numbers. But busloads have begun returning over the past year in anticipation of the Pope’s visit, Mr Schmid said.
“With the council [of Nicaea] anniversary, now the tour agencies are coming back with busloads of people,” Mr Schmid told The National, describing the arrival of visitors from Africa, the Hispanic world and India. “These tourists often call themselves pilgrims.”
Local officials hope that the Pope’s visit can cement Iznik’s place on the map as a pilgrimage destination, akin to other ancient Christian sites in Turkey such as Ephesus, a Unesco World Heritage Site in the country’s west.
Town mayor Kagan Mehmet Usta will greet Pope Leo when he arrives by helicopter on Friday.
“Our only wish and request is to thank him for coming to Iznik,” Mr Usta told The National from his municipality office. “At the very least, he has set an example for the world. He will have demonstrated the value of Iznik [to the world]. We will continue to host large numbers of guests here from now on.”
President Erdogan, a devout Muslim, has welcomed the Pope’s visit as he attempts to build Turkey’s reputation as a mediator in conflicts and a diplomatic centre.
But not everyone feels so positive about the visit. Some in Turkey – secular in its constitution – believe that the Pope’s visit is a form of proselytism. “He [President Erdogan] says let him come, I say don’t let him come,” said Nusret Sinan, 66, who runs a shop selling religious books.
Prof Sahin, who has devoted years of his life to excavating the Christian lake site, sees no problem with the Pope coming to worship at a place so important to his faith. Those who oppose his trip “are thinking a bit wrong”, he said.
“The Pope’s visit here will suddenly make this area a pilgrim centre,” he added. Sceptics might begin to change their minds when they see that faith tourists boost the local economy, he suggested.
“When they start to make some money from tourism, I wonder what they will be thinking in five years’ time,” he said.