Skilled in All Ways of Contending

On a cruise in the Aegean—the first time in 20 years—I am reminded that contending with adversaries lies at the heart of the human condition. For millennia, the lands and islands that are now the territories of Turkey and Greece have been contested by a bewildering array of tribes with conflicting tribal and religious identities.

Many of the places I have visited were the scenes of conflict between the Knights of Saint John and the Ottoman Turks. The following photo is of a little church that wa...