The Pope and the Patriarch of Moscow are to meet in Cuba before Bergoglio’s visit to Mexico, which begins next week: the Vatican and the Russian Patriarchate both announced the news at the same time.
A spirit of ecumenism is to mark Pope Francis’ upcoming trip to Mexico. It has just been announced that the Pope will be meeting the Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia, Kirill, in Cuba on 12 February. This encounter between the Bishop of Rome and a Bishop of what is referred to as the “Third Rome” - after the see of the Successor of Peter and the see of the Successor of the Apostle Andrew, in Constantinople - is going to be a first.The director of the Holy See Press Office, Fr. Federico Lombardi, communicated the news in a Vatican statement which he read out: “The Holy See and the Patriarchate of Moscow are pleased to announce that, by the grace of God, His Holiness Pope Francis and His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia will meet on February 12 next. Their meeting will take place in Cuba, where the Pope will make a stop on his way to Mexico, and where the Patriarch will be on an official visit. It will include a personal conversation at Havana’s José Martí International Airport, and will conclude with the signing of a joint declaration. This meeting of the Primates of the Catholic Church and the Russian Orthodox Church, after a long preparation, will be the first in history and will mark an important stage in relations between the two Churches. The Holy See and the Moscow Patriarchate hope that it will also be a sign of hope for all people of good will. They invite all Christians to pray fervently for God to bless this meeting, that it may bear good fruits.”
The meeting will last “two hours”, Fr. Lombardi informed. The two will be joined by Cuba’s President Raúl Castro during the exchange of gifts. In this unprecedented meeting between a Pope and a leader of the Russian Orthodox Church, Francis and Kirill will sign a joint declaration and address speeches to one another.
Raúl Castro will welcome the Pope off the aeroplane, which will be landing at Havana’s international airport. After approximately three hours, he will accompany Francis back to the aircraft, which will take the Pope to Mexico City “on schedule”, the Vatican spokesman said. He went on to highlight that “Pope Francis and Kirill are meeting following a two-year preparation period. Cuba is a “neutral” location so to speak but an important one for both parties, it is a crossroads in today’s world and in terms of its developments and is a place that is well known to the Russian Orthodox Church but also to the Holy See, in light of the three papal visits that took place between 1998 and today.”
Fr. Lombardi added that “having been informed about the upcoming meeting between the Pope and the Patriarch of Moscow Kirill, the ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew expressed his gladness and joy at the news of this embrace between the leader of the Catholic Church and the head of the world’s largest Orthodox community”.
Meanwhile, at a press conference held in the Patriarchate of Moscow’s Department for External Church Relations, Metropolitan Hilarion recalled that the historic meeting between the Patriarch of Moscow and the Pope “had been in the making for about 20 years” but was speeded up by the “Christian genocide” being caused by terrorists. In the face of what is going on and is “causing concern” to both Churches, the two spiritual leaders simply “had to meet”. Hilarion also confirmed that the historic first meeting between the Russian Orthodox Patriarch and the Pope will be taking place in Cuba and not Europe, because the Caribbean island is both “neutral territory” and a place where “Christianity is developing”. Europe on the other hand, is the scene of “conflict” between the two Churches, which still have problems, such as the issue of Ukrainian Greek Catholics, that need to be resolved. In the past, he added, Austria with its capital Vienna had featured in the list of possible “third countries” that could have hosted the potential meeting between the spiritual leaders of the two sister Churches.
On 30 November 2014, on the return flight from Istanbul, where he had – at the ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew’s invitation – presided over the solemn celebrations for the Feast of St. Andrew, Francis answered a question about a possible meeting with Kirill, put to him by Alexey Bukalov, correspondent in Rome of Russian news agency Itar-Tass, as such: “I told Patriarch Kirill, and he agreed, there is a willingness to meet … Both of us want to meet and move forward.”
Ecumenism is a priority for Francis who has often spoken about the “ecumenism of blood”, which involves the persecution of Christians of different denominations: “Our martyrs are crying out: “We are one! We already have unity, in spirit and in blood,” Francis said on the flight back from his apostolic visit to Istanbul. Francis also explained that the word “uniatism” is dated: “the Eastern Catholic Churches have a right to exist, but uniatism is a dated word. We cannot speak in these terms today. We need to find another way.” Indeed, uniatism is Ukraine continues to be a thorny issue in Catholic-Orthodox relations. Ukraine is home not only to Eastern-rite Catholics who are in full communion with Rome and Moscow’s Orthodox Church but also to two national autocephalous Churches.
A few days ago, in an interview published by Inside the Vatican, the President of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, Cardinal Koch, having commented on the importance of Francis’ decision to attend the Lutheran commemoration of the 500th anniversary of the Reformation in Lund, Sweden, next October, he said the following regarding a potential meeting with the Russian Patriarch: “The traffic lights have changed from red to yellow”. This indicated that there was some movement.
Kirill had planned a trip to Cuba in the very same period Francis was due to visit Mexico (12-17 February). He was invited by Raúl Castro in person, when the latter visited Moscow in May last year. Today’s announcement indicates that the meeting was planned slowly and in complete confidentiality and that the possibility of a meeting had been simmering away during the preparations for the Mexican voyage.
For many years now, there has been talk of a possible meeting between the leader of the Roman Catholic Church and the Patriarch of Moscow. John Paul II’s dream of a trip to Moscow never materialised. Despite the steps Wojtyla took to show ecumenical openness, writing for example in his “Ut unum sint” encyclical that he was willing to discuss the way in which the primacy of Peter was exercised, many doors remains shut. It must not be forgotten that the late Pope’s Polish origins was perceived by Orthdox Russians as an obstacle: relations between Russians and Poles had never been rosy throughout the course of history and the Bishop of Rome, who came from Wadowice, was portrayed as a Catholic “conqueror”. Tensions in relations were aggravated by John Paul II’s decision to establish actual Catholic dioceses in Russia.
Theologian Benedict XVI’s election strengthened the likelihood of a meeting which, however, never took place. When the then Patriarch of Moscow, Alexy II, died, Kirill took his place. The Russian Patriarch had a jurisdiction over two thirds of the world’s 200 million Orthodox faithful. His meeting with Francis in Havana will constitute a new and important step towards a complete thaw in relations, the consequences of which will extend beyond relations between Catholicism and Orthodoxy, to peace in the world.
