Greek Deputy Tourism Minister Anna Karamanli meets with ecclesiastical representatives as part of ongoing coordination on religious tourism policy.
Greece’s Joint Coordinating Committee for Religious Tourism held its first session of 2026 on February 18 at the Ministry of Tourism, marking the start of this year’s coordination process between state authorities and church institutions.
The meeting was chaired by Deputy Tourism Minister Anna Karamanli and brought together representatives of the Church of Greece, the Church of Crete, the Ecumenical Patriarchate, the Holy Community of Mount Athos, as well as officials from the Ministries of Tourism and Culture and the Greek National Tourism Organization (GNTO).
The session builds on the 2024 Cooperation Protocol initiated by Tourism Minister Olga Kefalogianni, which established a structured framework for the development and promotion of religious tourism.
In her opening remarks, Karamanli stressed the need for organized international promotion of Greece’s pilgrimage sites and religious traditions, while maintaining respect for their spiritual character and working in close coordination with ecclesiastical authorities.
Deputy Tourism Minister Anna Karamanli chairs the first 2026 session of the Joint Coordinating Committee for Religious Tourism, launching this year’s policy coordination between state authorities and church institutions.
She also called for a more contemporary approach to the sector. “It would be useful to view religious and pilgrimage tourism through a more modern lens, capable of meaningfully supporting the Church’s work and the coordinated promotion of our country abroad,” she said.
Participants submitted proposals with a practical and development-oriented focus. It was agreed that these proposals would be forwarded to the relevant ecclesiastical administrative centers for review and approval, after which implementation can begin.
The committee also decided to reconvene in the near future to assess progress on the agreed actions.
The meeting follows the government’s recent focus on positioning religious tourism as a year-round growth pillar within Greece’s broader tourism strategy.
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