**1. Introduction**

Religion has always existed in human life, as evidenced by Göbeklitepe (Magli 2016) dated to 10,000 B.C., Gantija (Sparavigna 2016) dated to 5500 B.C., and Stonehenge (Pearson et al. 2007) dated to 2300 B.C. Mankind has written hymns for their religious beliefs, created musical instruments, danced, sewed clothes, performed rituals, sacrificed, fought to the death, built magnificent structures, and traveled long and difficult distances. All of humanity's religious activities and products are now recognized as important components of cultural heritage's tangible and intangible values. As a consequence, religious heritage values have to be protected and preserved (UNESCO 2003).

UNESCO, the World Heritage Committee (WHC), the International Council on Monuments and Sites (ICOMOS), and the International Committee on Cultural Routes (CIIC) are among the important organizations actively working on the protection, promotion, and survival of cultural heritage. They work on identifying, documenting, maintaining, and transferring cultural heritage elements to cultural routes, including religious heritage. The Council of Europe (COE), which has a similar mission, gives greater visibility to routes related to religious people and religious buildings. COE is the international organization

**Citation:** Çelebi Karakök, Meryem Elif. 2023. Determining the Characteristics of Faith-Themed Routes in Order to Receive an International Certificate: Studies on St. Paul's Travels. *Religions* 14: 1097. https://doi.org/10.3390/rel14091097

Academic Editors: Fátima Matos Silva, Isabel Borges and Helena Albuquerque

Received: 28 June 2023 Revised: 3 August 2023 Accepted: 17 August 2023 Published: 24 August 2023

**Copyright:** © 2023 by the author. Licensee MDPI, Basel, Switzerland. This article is an open access article distributed under the terms and conditions of the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) license (https:// creativecommons.org/licenses/by/ 4.0/).

that organizes the most faith-themed routes; as of 2023, 12 of the 48 cultural routes are religious-themed (COE-CR 2023). UNESCO and WHC, as well as ICOMOS and CIIC, support route studies, nevertheless not as effectively as COE. Religious routes comprise four of the six cultural routes designated by UNESCO and the World Heritage Committee. Only two of these routes differ from the COE route list (UNESCO and WHC 2023). Only one of ICOMOS and CIIC's four cultural routes is religious, and it is also on the COE's list (ICOMOS and CIIC 2023). These organizations award certificates to routes that meet their criteria. A route's certification is critical since it allows the route to be recognized globally and makes it accessible to international tourism. In this case, the world has only 14 internationally certificated religious routes. These routes continue the historical cycle by introducing the tangible and intangible religious legacy into current society through sustainable tourism.

On the other hand, when all religious cultures worldwide are examined, it is considered that the 14 routes are insufficient to convey the phenomenon of religion to people today. Therefore, there is a need to increase the current number by re-activating the religious routes that have affected large masses. Many countries apply every year to obtain certificates from these organizations with various route studies. However, many applications are rejected as insufficient. Therefore, the goal of this study is to determine the effective criteria for religious routes to receive international certification. In this regard, the St. Paul's Travels Route, which Greece and Turkey work on individually, draws attention in the new religious route planning paradigm. St. Paul, who traveled to spread Christianity in the first century A.C., made four missionary trips. He is regarded as the most influential figure in the spread of Christianity from Jerusalem to Anatolia and then to Europe. Many churches in the Middle East, Turkey, and numerous European countries were constructed in his honor (IPDCT n.d.).

A cultural route is defined by the Council of Europe as the development of a travel route, a historical journey, a cultural concept, figure, or phenomenon of international importance for understanding Europe's common values and its transformation into a cultural, educational, heritage, and tourism cooperation project (COE-AR 2018). The UNESCO Cultural Heritage Committee accepted the concept of the cultural route in 1994, defining it as "the path/trace of the heritage consisting of concrete elements, where the cultural importance arising from the exchange and multidimensional dialogue between countries and regions is seen temporally and spatially along the route" (UNESCO and WHC 1994). ICOMOS defines the cultural route as an interactive and dynamic representation of different peoples' rich intercultural diversity and contributions to cultural heritage (ICOMOS 2008).

The transnational importance and richness of its historical, cultural, religious, geographical, and anthropological findings show that the St. Paul's Travels route has the criteria to be certified by these organizations. The route of St. Paul is a clear and detailed account of how Christianity spread from Asia to Europe. In order to fully comprehend the purpose, narrative, objectives, and implications of St. Paul's journeys, a reorganization to include all stops is necessary. To date, due to political and economic factors, the execution of St. Paul's travels has not been comprehensive and authentic. Greece's proposal includes Greece, Southern Cyprus, Italy, and Spain, where St. Paul may or may not have visited. According to belief, St. Paul visited Syria and many other parts of Turkey, but Syria cannot be visited today due to sociopolitical reasons. However, this does not explain why Turkey excludes St. Paul's stops from its scope (Baniotopoulou 2016). The St. Paul's Route in Turkey, on the other hand, runs for 500 km from Antalya's Perge Ancient City to Isparta's Antioch Ancient City. It is organized and implemented as a small local-route trip by a small Christian non-governmental organization in Antalya (CRS 2012). Consequently, neither route implementation has found St. Paul's route's true value and meaning.

The St. Paul's Route depicts the missionary journeys as narrated in the Bible. It holds religious, historical, and authenticity value. The four different travel routes it includes, as well as their actual stops, should be explained. All historical, geographical, religious, architectural, tangible, and intangible cultural data should be accurately transmitted to

current and future generations. The current practices are carried out in a deceptive manner. For example, a tourist who follows the route suggested by Greece will believe that St. Paul only traveled within the European continent, whereas a tourist who follows the route in Turkey will believe that St. Paul only walked 500 km in Turkey. This situation can cause alarming and funny situations in society.

However, because the majority of the European population is already Christian, the memories of St. Paul and the religious buildings built in his honor are preserved. The main issue is being addressed in Turkey and the Middle Eastern countries. In Turkey, for example, churches have been built in the name of St. Paul. Nevertheless, these churches are no longer in use because they lack a congregation. There are also church structures that were built recently and have historical and architectural value. The vast majority of these churches do not have a congregation. A significant portion of the churches are owned by Greece. Yet, Turkey and Greece face political challenges in restoring and utilizing these churches. Therefore, these churches had been abandoned and were on the verge of collapsing. As a result of St. Paul's efforts to spread his religion, these churches can be included in the cultural route, opened for use, re-functioned, and thus passed on to future generations. One of the goals of cultural routes is to protect all types of cultural heritage in the surrounding area. Another of the goals of cultural routes is to provide economic benefit and employment to the communities where they stop. The global economic crisis will be beneficial to the people at these stops because it will raise awareness about cultural heritage protection and develop their protective instinct. Since St. Paul visited 12 different countries on four separate trips, the inclusion of all these countries on the route will make St. Paul's Route richer, interesting, and instructive. More importantly, it will foster tolerance, mutual understanding, and feelings of peace among nations, peoples, and religions; it will fortify cultural ties between the European and Asian continents.
