Pope Francis says he hopes to travel to Turkey next year to commemorate the 1,700th anniversary of the Council of Nicaea, Christianity’s first ecumenical council. Nicaea is today located in İznik on a lake southeast of Istanbul. Francis is likely to use the occasion — the anniversary of a council before the Great Schism of 1054, which divided the church between East and West — to once again reach out to Orthodox Christians. The spiritual leader of the world’s Orthodox Christians, Patriarch Bartholomew I, said in September that he expects Francis to visit to commemorate the anniversary in May 2025.
