Christian religious communities in İzmir

Izmir was the home of one of the Seven Churches of the Revelation and played a signification role in the development of the church. St. Polycarp, the first bishop of Izmir. He was one of the disciples of St. John. He was born in Anatolia around A. D. 70. He was martyred for his faith by the Romans in 155. At the same time Izmir has been very important centre of the functions of a Christian missionary. The Catholic Community has been symbolized in the level of Episcopacy since 1344. In the years 1815, the history of Protestant Christians in Izmir begins with the coming of William Jowett, who was the member of the church of Anglican Missionary Society, and he was followed by other Protestant Missionaries. At the begining, they have interested in converting Jewish people and Greek Orthodox Christians into their own way of Christianity. That is why Orthodox church has showed reactions upon them. Then the British and American societies has abandoned these functions in 1850. By the time, the number of the Catholics, who lived in Izmir, has began to decrease. The migration of the new generation of the Catholics and the death of the old members of it are the reasons of this decrease. Nowadays we should estimate that the number of Catholic members is about 1240-1250. The members of the Catholic Church except the church of Saint Rosary are generally very old. At the same time, the members of the Protestant in Izmir and around it has increasingly reached to 410 from the year 1980. Allthough there had been a few churches in Izmir in those years, nowadays they has reached to 13. The Turks that had been converted in to Christianity could be shown as a basic reason for the increase of this number. Furthermore they are being the leaders of these churches. But we could only be able to give knowledge about the nine of them and unfortunately we couldn't establish communication with the other four churches. This study, consist of two chapters. In the first and the second chapters while it has been tried to give detailed place to the rituels, practices, and the socia! functions of the Catholic and the Protestant Churches, on the other hand the similar and the different aspects of them have been tried to be shown too.