Diplomacy, Spirituality, Alterity

Abstract

Among the many stories of people crossing to the other side of the divided island of Cyprus (following the opening of the barricades after almost three decades in April 2003), a particular event struck me as an exemplar of reconciliation at the human level. Returning to a church that had been turned into a mosque, a bitter symbol of occupation and ethnic cleansing, a Christian Greek-Cypriot man headed for a charged encounter with the Other. The imam in place, however, welcomed him as a most honoured guest, unfolding a red carpet so that he could walk inside the church/mosque without removing his shoes. Behind a white curtain, he unveiled the altar where the Christian relics were safely kept for the return of the dispossessed. Occupation and religious exclusivity aside, it was clear that the unused church was carefully modified into an interim mosque. The imam explained his past and present actions through a spiritual genealogy, for ‘We are all descendants of Adam and Eve, all brothers, one body’ meaning that it was his and indeed everyone’s foremost responsibility, irrespective of religion and ethnicity, ‘to love, respect and help each other as our Creator intended’. Capturing everything on camera and deeply moved by the event, the Greek-Cypriot man admitted to an epiphany, ‘a feeling that Cyprus expanded’ and became more accommodating (Demetriou, 2003).