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2. T U R K E Y :
MARATHON "BRIDGE-BUILDERS" END FIRST PHASE OF RECONCILIATION WALK
THE ARRIVAL OF a small team of walkers in Istanbul, this month, marks the end of the first stage of a major bridge-building initiative between Christians and their historical "enemies", Muslims and Jews.
The walkers set out for the Turkish capital from Germany in August, retracing the steps of the brutal Medieval Crusades whose "bitter legacy", they say, are centuries of conflict between the religions.
Due to arrive mid-month after traveling through Austria, Slovakia, Hungary, Serbia and Bulgaria, they will be the second group to bring the message of The Reconciliation Walk - sorrow for misrepresenting Christianity - to Istanbul.
Another team arrived in late August after a longer, 2,200-mile and five-month trek following one of the other main Crusade paths through France, Switzerland, Italy, Slovenia, Croatia, Albania, Macedonia and Greece.
Along the way both groups stopped to present to people they met a statement of apology expressing regret for the way the Crusades had betrayed the true message of Christianity by corrupting "its true meaning of reconciliation, forgiveness and selfless love".
Organizers say that the message has been well received by members of both Muslim and Jewish communities. The walkers were invited to explain what they were doing in mosques and synagogues, with the leader of one of the groups being declared an honorary rabbi so he could speak in public.
Both teams set out from Cologne Cathedral on Easter Sunday, on the 900th anniversary of the start of the First Crusade, led by Peter the Hermit. He led a following in response to Pope Urban II's call for a "holy war" to free Jerusalem from Muslim control.
Thousands of Muslims and Jews were killed in the years of fighting that ensued, and Reconciliation Walk organizers say that the relationship between Islam and Judaism, and Christianity, is to the present-day "warped by bitterness...rooted in a range of injustices and acts of betrayal, with the Crusades ranked chief amongst them".
Over the next two years hundreds of others are expected to join The Reconciliation Walk, taking the statement of regret throughout Turkey. The project will culminate in a special prayer event in Jerusalem in July 1999, to mark the 900th anniversary of the fall of the city.
Participants will help deliver the message personally to as many as two million Muslims and Jews, making "a significant contribution towards easing some of the major tensions in the world", according to international coordinator Lynn Green, Youth With A Mission's field director for Europe, the Middle East and Africa.
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