Pope, in Turkey, commemorates 1700th anniversary of Council of Nicaea, warns of ‘new Arianism’
November 29, 2025
On the second day of the first international trip of his pontificate, Pope Leo XIV made a pilgrimage to İznik, Turkey (historically Nicaea), where he commemorated the 1700th anniversary of the First Council of Nicaea, the first of the Church’s 21 ecumenical councils. Earlier in the day, in Istanbul, he warned of “a ‘new Arianism,’ present in today’s culture and sometimes even among believers.”
The Pope’s six-day apostolic journey, which began November 27, is taking him to Turkey (Türkiye) and Lebanon. The journey’s second day began yesterday in Istanbul, at a prayer meeting in the Cathedral of the Holy Spirit with bishops, priests, deacons, consecrated men and women, and pastoral workers.
Istanbul
At the prayer meeting (video), Pope Leo described Turkey as “a place where the story of the people of Israel meets the birth of Christianity, where the Old and New Testaments embrace and where the pages of numerous Councils were written.”
“The history that precedes you is not something merely to be remembered and then venerated as a glorious past while we look with resignation at how small the Catholic Church has become numerically,” he continued, referring to the small size of the Church in a nation of 84.1 million that is 98% Muslim. “On the contrary, we are invited to adopt an evangelical vision, enlightened by the Holy Spirit.”
The Pope added, “The Church in Türkiye is a small community, yet fruitful like a seed and leaven of the kingdom. I therefore encourage you to cultivate a spiritual attitude of confident hope, rooted in faith and in union with God. There is a need to witness to the Gospel with joy and look to the future with hope.”
Recalling the 1700th anniversary of the Council of Nicaea, Pope Leo spoke of three challenges:
- “the importance of grasping the essence of the faith and of being Christian”
- “the urgency of rediscovering in Christ the face of God the Father”
- “the mediation of faith and the development of doctrine”
Commenting on the second challenge, the Pope spoke of
a “new Arianism,” present in today’s culture and sometimes even among believers. This occurs when Jesus is admired on a merely human level, perhaps even with religious respect, yet not truly regarded as the living and true God among us. His divinity, his lordship over history, is overshadowed, and he is reduced to a great historical figure, a wise teacher, or a prophet who fought for justice—but nothing more. Nicaea reminds us that Jesus Christ is not a figure of the past; he is the Son of God present among us, guiding history toward the future promised by God.
Following the prayer meeting, Pope Leo visited the Little Sisters of the Poor in a home for the elderly (video).
“You are to be like Jesus, whom the Father sent to us not only to help and serve us, but also to be our brother,” the Pope said to the sisters. “The secret of Christian charity is that before being for others, we must first be with others in a communion based on fraternity.”
Addressing the elderly residents, he said:
In many social contexts, where efficiency and materialism dominate, the sense of respect for elderly people has been lost. In contrast, Sacred Scripture and good traditions teach us that—as Pope Francis loved to repeat—the elderly are the wisdom of a people, a treasure for their grandchildren, families and society as a whole.
The Pope wrote in the home’s guest book, “I affectionately bless this house and all its residents, and especially the Little Sisters of the Poor for their service here and their witness to all.”
In his last morning meeting, the Pontiff met for 15 minutes with David Sevi, the chief rabbi of Turkey.
İznik: Ecumenical prayer service
Following lunch, Pope Leo spent over an hour on a helicopter flight to İznik. There, he took part in an ecumenical prayer service near the archaeological excavations of the ancient Basilica of St. Neophytos (video).
“The 1700th anniversary of the First Council of Nicaea is a precious opportunity to ask ourselves who Jesus Christ is in the lives of men and women today, and who he is for each one of us personally,” the Pontiff said. “This question is especially important for Christians, who risk reducing Jesus Christ to a kind of charismatic leader or superman, a misrepresentation that ultimately leads to sadness and confusion.”
The Pope continued:
By denying the divinity of Christ, Arius reduced him to a mere intermediary between God and humanity, ignoring the reality of the Incarnation such that the divine and the human remained irremediably separated. But if God did not become man, how can mortal creatures participate in his immortal life? What was at stake at Nicaea, and is at stake today, is our faith in the God who, in Jesus Christ, became like us to make us “partakers of the divine nature” (2 Pt 1:4).
“Faith ‘in one Lord Jesus Christ, the Only Begotten Son of God, born of the Father before all ages... consubstantial with the Father’ (Nicene Creed) is a profound bond already uniting all Christians. In this sense, to quote Saint Augustine, in the ecumenical context we can also say that, ‘although we Christians are many, in the one Christ we are one.’“
“Consequently, with an awareness that we are already linked by such a profound bond, we can continue our journey of ever deeper adherence to the Word of God revealed in Jesus Christ, under the guidance of the Holy Spirit, in mutual love and dialogue,” the Pope added. “The desire for full communion among all believers in Jesus Christ is always accompanied by the search for fraternity among all human beings. In the Nicene Creed, we profess our faith ‘in one God, the Father.’ Yet, it would not be possible to invoke God as Father if we refused to recognize as brothers and sisters all other men and women, who are created in the image of God.”
Pope Leo thanked Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew of Constantinople, who holds a primacy of honor among the Orthodox churches, “for it was with great wisdom and foresight that he decided to commemorate together the 1700th anniversary of the Council of Nicaea in the very place where it was held.”
“I likewise warmly thank the Heads of Churches and Representatives of Christian World Communions who have accepted the invitation to participate in this event,” he added. “May God the Father, almighty and merciful, hear the fervent prayers we offer him today, and grant that this important anniversary may bear the abundant fruits of reconciliation, unity and peace.”
During the prayer service, Pope Leo and the Ecumenical Patriarch together recited the Nicene-Constantinopolitan Creed, without the words “and the son” (Filioque), which were added after the Creed’s composition.
“As Christians, the apostolic faith expressed at Nicaea is our victory,” Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew said in his own address. “Through this faith, the tyranny of sin is abolished in our lives, the slavery of corruption is dissolved, and earth is raised to heaven.”
After the prayer service, the Pope returned by helicopter to Istanbul, where he held a private evening meeting with Turkey’s bishops at the apostolic delegation.
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Further information:
- APOSTOLIC JOURNEY OF HIS HOLINESS POPE LEO XIV TO TÜRKIYE AND LEBANON WITH PILGRIMAGE TO İZNIK (TÜRKIYE) ON THE OCCASION OF THE 1700th ANNIVERSARY OF THE FIRST COUNCIL OF NICAEA (Dicastery for Communication - Libreria Editrice Vaticana)
- L’Osservatore Romano coverage (11/28/25)
- Pope Leo begins 1st international trip, calls on Turkey to be ‘source of stability and rapprochement’ (CWN, 11/28/25)
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