That pstriarcs Kirill avoided the meeting with the Pope in Kazakhstan “was in the air, also because a meeting had never been scheduled or officially communicated the participation of Patriarch Kirill”. This was stated by Don Stefano Caprio, a speaker of Russian spirituality at the Pontifical Oriental Institute in Rome and a visiting professor at the University of Moscow.
Interviewed by Maria Chiara Biagioni of SIR, Don Caprio recalls the visit that three weeks ago, the head of the Department for External Ecclesiastical Relations of the Moscow Patriarchate, Metropolitan Antonij of Volokolamsk, had made to Rome “even if it had not been made public the content of his meeting with the Pope, it was understood that the Patriarch did not intend to go to Nur Sultan in order not to expose himself in a context in which he would have been in the minority both towards the leaders of other religions, and thus avoid being subjected to a too much pacifist pressure, both towards Kazakhstan itself which is in a moment of tension with Russia because it does not recognize the Russian reasons neither regarding the annexation of Crimea nor the war in Ukraine ”.
“It would have been too embarrassing for the Patriarch who only intervenes when he is sure to have his say without contradictions”.
In short – the expert cuts short – the interreligious context that Nur Sultan offered, “was too ecumenical” and “the idea of reconciliation of all religions and all ethnic groups in a post-Soviet territory, is exactly the opposite of what Russia is trying to impose, that is, a resumption of Russia’s superiority ”.
The bilateral meeting between Kirill and Francesco was suspended and “as long as the war goes on – observes the expert -, this meeting will be difficult and since the war does not seem to come to a conclusion, for the moment everything has been put aside” . Don Caprio, however, warns against thinking that it was the war in Ukraine that stopped the dialogue between Rome and Moscow. “Ecumenical dialogue had already been blocked for several years”, argues the expert. “And it has been since the Russians refused to evaluate the question of primacy together with the other churches and since there was a break with Constantinople. These are all events of the last decade. The meeting in Havana had in a certain sense made it clear on the Orthodox side that they no longer wanted a theological dialogue on the contents and the Pope had accepted this position by giving the willingness to collaborate on a cultural and humanitarian level. The war has also interrupted this collaboration, but it is clear that as soon as the conflict subsides, the humanitarian urgency will become a priority ”.
However, one thing is certain: “the Vatican always tries to leave its doors open”. “The fact that the Pope received Metropolitan Antonji – observes Don Caprio – means that the dialogue continues and continues at a high level”. Open dialogue between religious leaders is important “not so much for war events. Those have their own logic on which religious authorities have little influence. What is important is the after. Ukraine is trying, especially where the conflict is less intense, to return to a certain normalcy and there is a need for an ecclesiastical unity among all the religious realities present in the territory starting from the autocephalous Orthodox church, the church linked to the Patriarch of Moscow, the Greek Catholics and the Catholics of the Latin rite.
All this implies the overcoming of centuries of mistrust and quarrels but the process of reconciliation and peace also passes through the attempt to undertake a path of rapprochement between the Churches ”.
Source: Sir