News release Obama meets with Ecumenical Patriach

ISTANBUL (ANA-MPA) -- Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I on Tuesday expressed optimism for the reopening of the Halki seminary and resolution of the long-standing problems faced by the Ecumenical Patriarchate, after a meeting here with new US President Barack Obama. "The Ecumenical Patriarchate is much more optimistic, both on the Halki theological seminary and regarding the problems we face, in general," Bartholomew said after a 15-minute in-camera meeting with Obama, held at the hotel where the US president is staying in the Bosporus metropolis. The meeting was also attended by White House chief of staff Rahm Emmanuel and Greek Orthodox Archbishop of America Demetrios. The Ecumenical Patriarch thanked Obama "for all he said concerning Halki yesterday (Monday) from the podium of the Turkish national assembly", underlining to the US president that the operation of the Orthodox Christian seminary on the eponymous Sea of Marmara island was essential for the Ecumenical Patriarchate. "This institution is necessary to renew its (the Ecumenical Patriarchate's) clergy and officials and to fulfil its lofty mission with dialogues with other Christian Churches, as well as the dialogue we have commenced in the past 20 years with the other monotheistic religions," the spiritual leader of the world's 300 million Orthodox Christians emphasised. Bartholomew further expressed appreciation for Obama's backing for Turkey's European course, which "we, as the Ecumenical Patriarchate, and I personally, have been doing for years and continue to do so". The Ecumenical Patriarch commented that Obama had been "very unassuming and very friendly, while he added that the congratulated the US president for the University of North Carolina's (UNC) victory in the NCAA final a day earlier. "He was impressed that I knew of it and was very pleased, laughed, and thanked me, and in that pleasant atmosphere we parted," the Ecumenical Patriarch stated.