The question is whether to give this attraction on...

The question is whether to give this attraction one star or five. As the location of one of the first churches constructed after the conversion of Constantine, this is a magnificent historical site containing a glorious edifice, well worth taking the time to see. As a Christian church converted first into a mosque after the Ottoman triumph over Constantinople in the late 1400s, and then a museum as a vestige of Ataturk's secular ideal in the 1900s, this storied building today is little more than a memorial to Turkey's abhorrence of its Christian and Byzantine roots.

Next door the Blue Mosque charges no entrance fee even as it remains an active mosque. But the Ottomans did their best to erase every Christian influence and symbol from Hagia Sophia. In spite of a few wall and roof sections where Ottoman plaster has fallen away revealing the underlying Christian mosaics, Hagia Sophia remains a Muslim building.

It's ironic that the Turkish government forbids taking pictures of the Christian mosaics today, claiming a desire to protect them, when predecessor governments did everything they could with hammer, chisel and plaster to erase the very mosaics that today they forbid taking photographs of to "protect."

This building, originally constructed by Constantine (or perhaps Constantius II) was rebuilt following riots and fire in 540 by Emperor Justinian. It's a stunning example of Byzantine architecture that remained the largest church in Christendom for nearly a millennia.

Today it's little different from many of the other cathedrals of Europe which have been turned into museums by secular governments--with, of course, the additional indignity if a layer of Islam covering its Christian roots.

Visit it if you enjoy the sites of past glories. For a Christian, there's none there today.