A Historic Meeting in Cuba

Patriarch Kirill has been the head of the Russian Orthodox Church since February 2009, while Pope Francis took up his role in March 2013.

Pope Francis and Patriarch Kirill I are scheduled to meet at Havana’s airport on Friday of next week.

“After centuries it is the first time that the pope will meet with the head of the Russian Orthodox Church”. He spoke to Susy Hodges shortly after the announcement that this historic meeting between the two spiritual leaders will take place in Cuba on February 12th.

While there are still issues separating the two organizations, “we need to put aside internal disagreements and pool efforts to save Christianity in the regions where it is subject to most severe persecution”, he added.

Patriarch Kirill with and without his fancy wristwatch.

“Every step toward dialogue, understanding, a will to draw closer to each other, understand each other and walk together” after “a past of distancing themselves and even of polemics and division is a positive sign for everyone”, especially considering the huge numbers of Catholics and Russian Orthodox in the world, the spokesman said.

A senior Orthodox cleric, Metropolitan Hilarion, said long-standing differences between the churches remained, most notably a row over the status of the Uniate church in Ukraine.

Pope Francis arrives to celebrate the First Vespers in Saint Peter’s Church, Vatican City, 11 April 2015. It has also expressed a gentle skepticism about efforts to unite “diaspora” Orthodox communities, that is, to establish independent Orthodox churches in, for example, America and Western Europe.

Relations have warmed of late between Rome and other branches of the Orthodox tradition, but the Russian one, the most influential in the Eastern family, has maintained its distance, until now.

The Roman Catholic Church, which has 1.2 billion followers compared to the Russian Orthodox Church’s 165 million (Eastern Orthodox churches combined claim a membership of around 300 million), was thrilled with the patriarch’s acceptance.

The meeting has been in preparation for two decades and both Moscow and the Vatican agreed that some neutral country would be most suited for it. Austria and Hungary were among those considered, but Cuba was eventually chosen. Both the Vatican and the Orthodox Church have been outspoken in denouncing attacks on Christians and the destruction of Christian monuments, particularly in Syria. Byzantine-rite Catholics who once could worship only in a Russian Orthodox church, returned to Catholic services and sought the return of Church property.

Vatican spokesperson, Father Federico Lombardi hailed the forthcoming reunion.

The Vatican has existing ties with the Istanbul-based Ecumenical Patriarch, Bartholomew.

His overt support for Putin made him a target of a furious Internet campaign by bloggers who soon discovered that the patriarch was the owner of a luxury Moscow flat and a lavish residence on the Black Sea.