Protestants (including
Anglicans
Anglicanism is a Western
Western may refer to:
Places
*Western, Nebraska, a village in the US
*Western, New York, a town in the US
*Western Creek, Tasmania, a locality in Australia
*Western Junction, Tasmania, a locality in Australia ...
) are a very small religious minority in
Turkey
Turkey ( tr, Türkiye ), officially the Republic of Türkiye ( tr, Türkiye Cumhuriyeti, links=no ), is a transcontinental country located mainly on the Anatolian Peninsula in Western Asia, with a small portion on the Balkan Peninsula in ...
, comprising less than one tenth of one percent of the population.
Though, there are several significant and major Protestant churches and worship sites in Turkey protected legally, most of them are located in the 4 large cities of
Istanbul
)
, postal_code_type = Postal code
, postal_code = 34000 to 34990
, area_code = +90 212 (European side) +90 216 (Asian side)
, registration_plate = 34
, blank_name_sec2 = GeoTLD
, blank_i ...
,
Izmir,
Ankara
Ankara ( , ; ), historically known as Ancyra and Angora, is the capital of Turkey. Located in the central part of Anatolia, the city has a population of 5.1 million in its urban center and over 5.7 million in Ankara Province, maki ...
and
Bursa.
Considerable ones and significant communities include the
Dutch
Dutch commonly refers to:
* Something of, from, or related to the Netherlands
* Dutch people ()
* Dutch language ()
Dutch may also refer to:
Places
* Dutch, West Virginia, a community in the United States
* Pennsylvania Dutch Country
People E ...
Union Church of Istanbul The Union Church of Istanbul is an interdenominational, international, protestant, evangelical church, meeting since 1857 in the Dutch Chapel, which is located on the grounds of the Consulate General of the Netherlands in Istanbul (formerly the Emba ...
, German Protestant Church (Istanbul), Armenian Protestant Church (Istanbul) and the All Saints Church in Istanbul.
Violence against Christians
The
constitution of Turkey recognizes freedom of religion for individuals. The Armenian Protestants own three Istanbul Churches from the 19th century.
On November 4, 2006, a Protestant place of worship was attacked with six
Molotov cocktail
A Molotov cocktail (among several other names – ''see other names'') is a hand thrown incendiary weapon constructed from a frangible container filled with flammable substances equipped with a fuse (typically a glass bottle filled with fla ...
s. In 2007 three Protestants were killed at a Bible publishing house in
Malatya
Malatya ( hy, Մալաթիա, translit=Malat'ya; Syro-Aramaic ܡܠܝܛܝܢܐ Malīṭīná; ku, Meletî; Ancient Greek: Μελιτηνή) is a large city in the Eastern Anatolia region of Turkey and the capital of Malatya Province. The city h ...
, allegedly by the illegal and split-away gendarmerie unit
JİTEM
Jandarma İstihbarat ve Terörle Mücadele or Jandarma İstihbarat Teşkilatı (abbr. ''JİTEM'' or ''JİT''; English: "Gendarmerie Intelligence and Counter-Terrorism" or "Gendarmerie Intelligence Organization") is the unofficial and illegal intel ...
. Turkish pro-AKP (government) and conservative media has criticized Christian missionary activity intensely.
There is an Alliance of Protestant Churches in Turkey, supporting protection of Protestant rights legally.
Turkish converts
There is an
ethnic Turkish Protestant
Protestantism is a branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century against what its followers perceived to b ...
Christian community in Turkey numbering around ~10,000, mostly adherents, and most of them coming from a Muslim Turkish background. In 2003, the
Milliyet newspaper claimed that 35,000 Turkish Muslims had converted to Christianity.
A 2015 study estimates about 4,500 Christians are from a previous Muslim background in the country. While other sources estimated the number of the Turkish who converted to Christianity (most of them secret worshippers) between 4,000–6,000, or more than those numbers.
Protestant denominations
*
Baptist church
*
Bulgarian Congregational Church
*
Evangelical Alliance Church
Evangelicalism (), also called evangelical Christianity or evangelical Protestantism, is a worldwide interdenominational movement within Protestant Christianity that affirms the centrality of being "born again", in which an individual experi ...
*
German Protestant Church
The Evangelical Church in Germany (german: Evangelische Kirche in Deutschland, abbreviated EKD) is a federation of twenty Lutheran, Reformed (Calvinist) and United (e.g. Prussian Union) Protestant regional churches and denominations in Germany ...
*
Greek Evangelical Church
*
Religious Society of Friends
Quakers are people who belong to a historically Protestant Christian set of Christian denomination, denominations known formally as the Religious Society of Friends. Members of these movements ("theFriends") are generally united by a belie ...
*Turk Protestant Church, Turkish Protestant Church
official web site of Turk Protestant Church
/ref>
*Union Church of Istanbul
*Union of the Armenian Evangelical Churches in the Near East
*Church of England
See also
* Christianity in Turkey
* Religious minorities in Turkey
References
Source of the list: The World Christian Encyclopedia, Second edition, Volume 1, p. 756
{{Europe topic, Protestantism in
Protestantism in Turkey,
Protestantism by country, Turkey