Updated Country Profile - Turkey

Click here to access the updated Reaching the Nations country profile for Turkey. The Church originally opened its Turkish Mission in 1884 and intermittent missionary efforts occurred among Armenians and Arabs in the mission until its headquarters were transferred to Syria in the 1930s. Although branches were organized in several cities during the 1970s for American military and foreigners who lived in the country, it was not until the 1980s when Turks began to join the Church in larger numbers. Nevertheless, Turks have been largely unreceptive to the Latter-day Saint gospel message albeit foreign groups, such as Iranians and Iraqis, have been receptive and join the Church regularly. Today, Iranians outnumber other ethnic groups in multiple branches, and the branch in one city (Isparta) is an Iranian Persian-speaking congregation. The Church first assigned proselytizing missionaries to Turkey in 2012, but their presence was periodically interrupted by visa renewal problems or political instability. Finally, the Church withdrew these missionaries in 2018 after greater safety threats were evident following the government's suspicions of the Church's involvement in the failed political coup. See below for the Future Prospects section of this article:

The assignment of proselytizing, full-time missionaries in the past decade was a significant development for not only the Church in Turkey but the Church’s efforts to reach Muslim-majority nations. The proactive efforts of the Church to also organize a mission headquartered in Istanbul and expand missionary activity into previously unreached cities is highly commendable in an era where the Church has been very conservative in its outreach expansion efforts in neighboring nations. These efforts led to quick tangible results, such as increases in church attendance, membership totals, and the number of congregations. The high receptivity among Iranians in Turkey has been one of the most noteworthy developments which has resulted in Iranians outnumbering all other ethnic groups in multiple congregations, and the organization of the first-ever Iranian Persian-speaking branch in Turkey in the city of Isparta. The withdrawal of foreign, full-time missionaries has come at a most unfortunate time in which the Church has achieved significant headway in establishing a Latter-day Saint community that is not predominantly comprised of Western expatriates. The ongoing absence of foreign full-time missionaries will be an important period to test the durability of new converts and whether the Church can achieve greater self-sufficiency in its functioning with little-to-no outsourced leadership resources.