Ayhan Gurkan passes out olive branches during a special Saturday afternoon mass on the eve of Palm Sunday at Mor Barsavmo church in Midyat in the Tur Abdin region of southeastern Turkey on April 19, 2003. Gurkan is Midyat's priest in training as the town's only priest has been active for over 40 years. The Suryani are Syrian Orthodox Christians, a semitic people living in the area historically known as northern Mesopotamia, the Tur Abdin region, for about 5,000 years. They are one of the...
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Ayhan Gurkan passes out olive branches during a special Saturday afternoon mass on the eve of Palm Sunday at Mor Barsavmo church in Midyat in the Tur Abdin region of southeastern Turkey on April 19, 2003. Gurkan is Midyat's priest in training as the town's only priest has been active for over 40 years. The Suryani are Syrian Orthodox Christians, a semitic people living in the area historically known as northern Mesopotamia, the Tur Abdin region, for about 5,000 years. They are one of the oldest cultures to have adopted Christianity, doing so some 300 years before the Romans.....
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