Dispatch: Erdogan prays with Muslims in Hagia Sophia after former church is converted to a mosque

People had travelled thousands of miles and slept on the cobbled streets to get a spot inside.

In Istanbul, a city famed for its towering minarets and echoing calls to prayer, Friday Islamic prayers on Friday returned to the Hagia Sophia for the first time in almost 90 years.

Wearing a white skull cap, Turkey's President Recep Tayyip Erdogan led the pre-prayer recital, and for many in the crowd, he was the personal righter of an historic wrong.

“It should never have been turned into a museum,” said Ufuk Tavusbay, 26, who had travelled from Belgium with his younger brother for the opportunity to pray at the mosque. “If you knew what it felt to Muslims, then you’d understand”.

Originally built as a Byzantine cathedral in 537 AD, for centuries the Hagia Sophia was a Greek Orthodox church, though it had a spell as a Roman Catholic cathedral in the 1400s.

Following his conquest of Constantinople in 1453, Ottoman leader Sultan Mehmet the II turned the building into a mosque for the first time. It remained so until 1935.

Then, the Ottoman Empire fell, and in its wake rose Mustafa Kemal Attaturk, with his vision for a secular Turkey. Attaturk designated the building a museum, open to all faiths; an artefact of Turkey’s religious and cultural diversity.

The religious struggle for Turkey’s most famous building was over, or so many thought.

For 86 years, Hagia Sophia was the jewel in Turkey’s tourism industry and a Unesco World Heritage Site. Christians and Muslims from across the world could visit, though there was no organised worship.

That status quo was upended earlier this month when President Erdogan decreed the building would once again open its doors for prayers as a mosque.

Conservatives in the country had long pursued the change, it too played well with Mr Erdogan’s nationalist and religious base, but outside of Turkey, it has drawn fierce criticism.

Christians across the world voiced their anger, and Pope Francis said he was “pained” by the decision, and was urged to intervene by Greece’s president.

In a response criticised as flippant, Mr Erdogan invited him to the opening. US Secretary of State Mike Pompeo also urged the Turkish president not to go through with it, while others went further.

Archbishop leronymous, the head of the Greek Orthodox Church, called it an “unholy act of defiling”, and held a day of mourning in churches across Greece on Friday.

Cultural and antiquities experts also expressed dismay. Among them Unesco, the UN’s cultural agency, which said it “deeply regrets the decision” made “without prior discussion”.

Ahead of the prayers, drapes were hung to hide ornate mosaics of the Virgin Mary and the archangel Gabriel, and dark green carpets personally chosen by Mr Erdogan were spread across the stone floor.

Turkish wool was chosen over fire-retardant wool from New Zealand favoured by experts. Mr Erdogan’s decision has animated his political base.

Thousands from the fiercely loyal Turkish diaspora in Europe booked flights home to attend, whilst an army of loyal analysts and political figures stood ready to shoot down any critics of the decision.

The change at Hagia Sophia comes as Turkey also goes to war with social media companies.

Mr Erdogan's government is going ahead with proposed measures to block social media sites if they fail to comply with strict new regulations, and a draft bill was approved by Turkey's justice commission on Friday.

Critics of Mr Erdogan’s increasingly religious rule have described re-branding Hagia Sophia as yet another wound in secular Turkey Ataturk built almost a century ago, yet for others, the building is an expression of the Turkey of the 21st century.

Some worshippers inside justified the change by pointing to Europe’s complicated history with Muslim places of worship.

“Have you been to Spain? Have you seen the Mosques turned into Churches in Cordoba”, said Ozgur Gun, 40 who had travelled from Urfa, almost 1000 kilometres away on the border with Syria.

“It was built as a place of worship. Christians are welcome to visit, of course, but they cannot pray here.

“This is about what it means to be Turkish, and what it means to be a Muslim.”