Bridging Church History, Geopolitics, and Digital Education: A New Approach to Teaching Religious Heritage

ABSTRACT The paper explores the use of digital technologies in religious education by focusing on a specific initiative: the development of a virtual tour within a learning management system to teach the history of Hagia Sophia. In responding to the primary research question, inquiring into the extent that contemporary technologies can enhance knowledge of ecclesiastical history and geopolitical transformation, a case study is examined: Hagia Sophia's transformation from Byzantine church to Ottoman Mosque and museum. While there are already some studies in the context of religious education regarding conventional ways of teaching church history, there is still a need to understand how far the use of technology could provide more interactive and engaging learning experiences. This paper, therefore, tries to fill this gap by exploring this intersection of religion, architecture, and empire through interactive, web‐based technologies. The research adopts qualitative and quantitative assessment methods in terms of questionnaires and reflective discussions to examine the effects of the intervention on student engagement, historical interpretation, and critical thinking. It emerged that the virtual tour greatly enhanced the students' participation and understanding and engendered a deeper interest in the historical and cultural changes that Hagia Sophia has come to represent.