July 11, 2026
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HERE'S MY TAKE
Last week, I reflected on America's 250th birthday, suggesting that the greatest gift our neighbours could give themselves—and the world—is a renewed appreciation of the values, institutions, and habits that made the United States worthy of celebration in the first place.
Of course, that advice extends beyond America. Over the past two weeks, I participated in conferences in London and Istanbul, and the experience provided a first-hand reminder that a civilization is shaped by more than its history. Cultures are ways of life shaped by the institutions, symbols, stories, and acts of worship that form us over generations.
Istanbul is an especially fascinating example. Occupying a strategic location between Europe and Asia, it is the living inheritance of multiple civilizations. Founded by Greek settlers as Byzantium around 657 BC, the city was transformed in AD 330 when Emperor Constantine made it the capital of what he envisioned as a renewed Roman Empire. Although he officially named it New Rome, the world quickly came to know it as Constantinople.
Following the Ottoman conquest in 1453, the Turkish-speaking population increasingly referred to it simply as Istanbul, a name widely believed to derive from a Greek phrase meaning "to the city." Yet Constantinople remained the city's formal international name for centuries. Only in 1930 did the Republic of Turkey require the use of Istanbul in international correspondence.
Politics often takes a while to catch up with culture. In this case, the people had been calling it Istanbul for centuries before the state finally made it official.
That layered civilizational history is visible everywhere.
The Hagia Sophia, completed in AD 537, was the cathedral of the Byzantine Empire and was the largest church in Christendom for nearly a thousand years. It became an imperial mosque after the Ottoman conquest. Today, visitors stand beneath soaring Christian mosaics while hearing the call to Muslim prayer, with Qur’anic roundels hanging alongside images that survived centuries of conquest, concealment, and restoration. Few buildings illustrate more vividly that civilizations rarely erase one another completely. More often, they build upon, transform, and reinterpret what came before.
You can reject or try to reframe your past, but you cannot escape the fact that it has and will continue to impact you. It’s a lesson clear in the architecture, but one that is more important in our personal, organizational, and civic lives than we probably give credit to.
The same story appears in smaller ways. Each morning, I would enjoy a cup of Turkish coffee and several cats would join me in the café. The cats are everywhere—in the church sanctuary, in store windows, and beside restaurant tables. Nobody appears to own them, yet everyone appears to care for them. They are not pets so much as fellow citizens. It reflects an unwritten social compact shaped by practical necessity, neighbourhood custom, and an Islamic tradition that has long regarded kindness toward cats as a virtue. Stories of the Prophet Muhammad's affection for cats remain widely known throughout the Muslim world, and the city's feline residents continue to embody that cultural inheritance.
Next to the cats, the police are impossible to miss. I wasn't staying far from where recent protests had taken place, although in five days, I observed no signs of unrest. What struck me was the visibility of law enforcement. It was common to see half a dozen officers gathered at major intersections, weapons prominent and body shields nearby. They were approachable and courteous, and as a visitor, their presence contributed to a genuine sense of security. Yet I also found myself reflecting that security and liberty are related, but they are not identical. I felt safe. Whether I also felt free was a more complicated question.
Neither observation makes much sense apart from history. To walk through Istanbul is to be reminded that for nearly seventeen centuries this city has stood at the crossroads of Europe and Asia, Christianity and Islam, East and West. Churches became mosques. Palaces became museums. Empires rose and fell. Yet each left marks that remain visible today.
That history came alive on Sunday morning as I worshipped at Christ Church, the Crimean Memorial Church, an Anglican congregation established after the Crimean War. Fewer than fifty worshippers gathered for the English-language service, representing a range of nationalities. In a city that is more than 99 percent Muslim (although according to the cab driver, no more than 60 percent are faithful practitioners), the size of the congregation was hardly surprising.
But it was Christian worship and not a museum exhibit. The organ accompanied Wesley's hymns. An intern preached a thoughtful sermon on Romans 8, reflecting on creation's groaning and the Christian hope that enables us to make sense of suffering. The congregation also celebrated the forty-fourth anniversary of the rector's ordination—a quiet reminder that faithful ministry is measured over decades rather than headlines. I was also told of the church's vibrant ministry among refugees who arrive in this remarkable city.
Two days earlier, I had attended Friday evensong at St. Paul's Cathedral in London. The services were remarkably similar. The same Anglican tradition. Familiar prayers, retaining their beautiful archaic English, spoken with conviction by worshippers in accented English. Yet the settings could hardly have been more different. St. Paul's has stood for more than three centuries at the heart of English public life, hosting royal celebrations, national commemorations, and moments when Britain's identity has been expressed through public worship.
Christ Church, by contrast, is a faithful minority witness within a very different civilizational context. Built on land gifted by Sultan Abdülmecid as an expression of thanks to England for its allyship in the Crimean War, the project was financed in part by the British Crown and other British philanthropists as part of an appeal “that God would be worshipped from generation to generation.” More than 160 years later, I could recite the Apostles’ Creed and worship alongside fellow believers, an answer to prayers that accompanied gifts many generations ago.
Civilizations express themselves through far more than politics. Architecture tells a story. Public squares tell a story. Charity tells a story. The treatment of animals tells a story. Places of worship tell a story in an especially profound way. Show me where a people gathers before God, what it builds to endure for centuries, and what it considers worthy of beauty, and I will understand far more about that society than by reading its latest election platform.
It also reminded me of how profoundly context shapes Christian witness. In London, I moved easily within a culture whose assumptions, language, and institutions felt familiar. Istanbul required much more intentionality. The currency, the language, the food, the customs, and even crossing the street demanded attention. Being a stranger has a way of making one more observant, more humble, and perhaps more appreciative of the countless cultural assumptions we rarely notice at home. The amplified calls to prayer, restaurants within a certain distance of a mosque not legally allowed to serve alcohol, and the religiously conforming dress of women (although to my surprise, only a distinct minority) were the only explicitly Muslim practices I encountered, although it permeated the culture such that there was no mistaking you were in a different religious context.
Even texting friends back home required a moment's reflection. Was I in Byzantium? Constantinople? Istanbul? I have sufficiently geeky friends that whichever name I chose would prompt a retort. Places accumulate layers of meaning. The words we choose are interpreted as sending a message. Wisdom requires understanding not only how they came to be, but also what they have become, and how to speak about them faithfully.
Perhaps that is the lesson North Americans most need to recover. We spend enormous energy debating what we should do next while giving comparatively little attention to who we are becoming. Identity is not ultimately determined by skin colour, how many generations one's family has occupied a particular place, or even the stories we tell about ourselves. It is revealed by the institutions we build, the symbols we preserve, the habits we cultivate, and the worship that orders our loves.
Last week, I argued that America's 250th should be an occasion to recover the values that made the nation worth celebrating. After spending ten days abroad, I would reaffirm that observation. Civilizations are not renewed merely by winning elections or passing better legislation. They are renewed when ordinary people recover the habits, institutions, and forms of worship that teach successive generations what is true, good, and beautiful.
Long after today's political arguments have faded, the cities we build will still tell stories. Their architecture will reveal what they honoured. Their public spaces will reveal what they celebrated. Their churches will reveal whom they worshipped. And, in Istanbul at least, even the cats remind visitors that politics may shape a nation, but it is culture that ultimately forms a civilization.
WHAT I’M LISTENING TO
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