This man that we are dressing here is Kirill, The Patriarch of Moscow, Incarnation of a power, which hardly appears on our Western radars. This power is that of the Russian Orthodox Church. A Church that expands tirelessly, even abroad. As here in Paris in 2016 during the consecration of the new Orthodox cathedral Head of the entire Russian church, Kirill continues to rub shoulders with the powerful of this world... Barack Obama, Pope Francis, including XI Jinping, the Chinese president , or even Bachar El Assad and of course… Vladimir Putin. Between the political leader and the Patriarch, a closeness displayed Two powers which together are building a new Russian identity, ultra-conservative. Two powers that complement each other, add up and sometimes... diverge. The Russian church, a new player in international relations, is waging a fight that is as political as it is spiritual. This man, difficult to access, the equivalent of a pope in the eyes of the Russians, let us follow him for almost a year. A gray city at the fall of communism, Moscow has become in thirty years a capital with golden and sparkling bulbs. Since 2010, nearly 50 churches have been built and almost as many are under construction. It is in the capital that the Patriarchate is located. The headquarters of the Orthodox Church is diving there and is inevitably getting closer to the current Russian power. Behind the walls of this monastery guarded by a few Cossacks, an institution as enigmatic as it is difficult to access. A universe in which Kirill reigns over 36,000 parishes and claims more than a hundred million believers, or more than one in three Orthodox people in the world. Kirill's first morning ritual, always a prayer, and a mass in Slavonic, liturgical Russian. Everything recalls the oriental heritage of the orthodox Christian religion. That of Constantinople, where the patriarch was almost the equal of the emperor. The Moscow Patriarchate has existed for five centuries. Fifteen patriarchs led it before Kirill, elected in 2009. He has a particular ambition for his church, imagined since the breakup of the USSR. Kirill's project is truly to restore the Russian Church as a universal power. The permanent image that he actually has deep within him is this Roman power, a church which truly functions, which has cadres which radiate throughout the world. A church whose influence is felt in all areas of life, whether politics, society, but also obviously, internationally, that is to say a church which truly has a global destiny. From his offices in Moscow, Kirill unambiguously assumes that he is not limited to the role of spiritual guide. I am criticized for being too present as Patriarch. But I consider that I have no other choice. Particularly in our time, a priest, a bishop, and especially a patriarch must have the opportunity to correctly represent the church or Christianity in dialogue with any individual and in particular with heads of state and representatives of the world of politics, business, culture… Mr. President.
- Nice to see you - Thank you very much. I'm happy to be here. That day, it was Mahmoud Abbas, Head of the Palestinian Authority who came to see the Patriarch. They know each other, have already met several times. We are very concerned about the situation in the Middle East, Syria and Iraq. Terrorism has not been completely eradicated and therefore the danger of terrorist acts in the Middle East is still present, which obviously worries us. Of course, we know that many have fallen prey to extremist terrorism guided by DAESH and others. And as you know, we stand together with other countries that promote security and peace and particularly the Russian government which is also leading this fight. Beyond civilized speeches, essential discussions will continue far from the cameras. Two days earlier, this delegation already met Vladimir Putin. Donald Trump's America has just decreed that it was going to move its embassy to Jerusalem. On the Palestinian side, these meetings therefore aim to strengthen crucial support from Russia. And this also happens through the Patriarchy. Religion and politics are intertwined, so if you want to protect peace and the holy land, the church must play a political role. Patriarch Kirill can talk easily with President Putin, he can talk with the Vatican and he can talk with the Patriarch of Jerusalem. We need him and his support. We need his help. Ah…. I have other gifts for your delegation.
It is a picture of Jerusalem which is yours as well as ours. And we always protected her. You like us. He is not simply a church leader when he meets Mahmoud Abbas, he is also a negotiator. You should know that among the Palestinians there are many Orthodox there are many Christians, for Patriarch Kirill, the protection of Eastern Christians, with which the Palestinian question is associated, is a major issue for the Russian presence in the region. Kirill's other place in Moscow is the Cathedral of Christ the Savior. A cathedral symbolic of the religious renaissance of the country, Swimming pool in the Soviet era, Rebuilt from 1995 Kirill does not go there to give a mass. In the underground aisles of the cathedral he joins some of the most powerful men in the country. Those in Putin’s inner circle. the chairman of the Duma, the Russian National Assembly, the deputy head of the presidential administration, and the chairman of the Constitutional Council, -May God help you in your work of great responsibility. -Okay, let's go! All participate, at the invitation of the Patriarch, in the “World Council of the Russian People”. An annual meeting, created by Kirill, 25 years ago, at the fall of the USSR to unify the nation around the church, at a time when the empire was disintegrating. In the room, and on the platform, clergy, members of the army, the nationalist fringe of civil society, but also and above all, representatives of the main political parties including Putin's party, United Russia, the extreme right and even the Communist Party. The World People's Council fits perfectly with this man's ambitious agenda, with his way of seeing the Church. He truly sees the Church as the hard core that brings together the Russian people in general and the political elite in particular. This year, the theme of the council is Russia in the 21st century. The threats targeting the family and society are the same: the excesses of juvenile justice, same-sex marriages, the affirmation of transhumanism, all attempts to give a distorted definition to the concept of human. A political forum, where everyone sings the national anthem, united around ultra-conservative values. A council designed to better propagate patriotism through speeches then broadcast on major television channels. A gathering where the far-right leader Vladimir Zhirinovsky is one of Kirill's stated supporters. Everyone will have their photo. But don't make any noise. Come on ! Get there! Come on, it's okay, click. Is the second face yours or mine? Do you see me? It's good ! Come on ! It's good ! Click! It's good. Who else ? That's all. Nowadays, the Russian Orthodox Church plays an important role. We are not a religious state. But we are done with atheism. Those who wish can remain atheists. But today the Church plays the same role that it played in the time of the Tsar. At the time of the Tsar, in the centuries preceding the revolution, the church was the only spiritual, cultural and identity matrix of society. The Patriarch was one of the primary powers in Russia, alongside the Tsar. The very fact that this Council was created is proof that Kirill is among the leading political leaders in Russia. Without a doubt. It is no coincidence that when we look at the informal list of the most influential, we always find it in the top ten. In addition, this assembly gives a form of legitimacy to the State, it is one of the most important sources of political legitimation. Today a church which brings a form of respectability to power A power which in return brings it part of its greatness. Strange reversal, however, it is the same political power which sought to annihilate it for nearly 70 years. Between 1917 and 1939, the church suffered three waves of persecution. Religious people are one of the first enemies of the revolution. Churches are destroyed, they are pillaged. Expressing one's faith becomes an offense of opinion, members of the clergy are deprived of their civil rights, often arrested and deported to camps... In 1939, almost all of the churches existing before the revolution were been closed or destroyed. Kirill likes to celebrate this past. He goes every year to the Solovki Islands, an archipelago in the north east of Russia, as beautiful as it is symbolic. Thank you ! I am very happy to arrive in the holy land. And we are very happy to welcome you to the land of Solovki. Thank you so much. On this archipelago stands a monastery, which became part of the first Soviet concentration camp in the 1920s , the first laboratory of what would become the Gulag. And symbol of repression against religion. 80,000 detainees passed through this camp and around a third would not have returned. On the program during these two days for Kirill, supervision with the Minister of Culture of the restoration of this place. It was not in this building by chance that the shootings were carried out? No, there are no traces of gunfire. When we arrived here in 1972 with Monseigneur Metropolitan Nicodemus, we found, we were shown the place, the room of the shootings. There was an old gentleman here who knew all this, where it happened, he told us. he had not learned it from books. He was a former resident of Solovki. After asking him a lot of questions, he said to me: “Come on, go in there, then on this side and on the other. » It would be important to find this piece. It is a place of memory. Because we thought the shootings took place at the cemetery. This was not the case. They were killing here in the building. Only then did they take the bodies out and bury them. Through this visit and the desire to restore this place, it is also a question of reviving the memory of Soviet persecution among the faithful, the minister and our camera. Where ? Here ! Hide the phone. Persecutions, a memory that the patriarch seeks to appropriate. He is the heir in a personal capacity. His grandfather was imprisoned in Solovki, in the same monastery, for religious reasons. He left me a lesson. Before he died he told me: “in this world do not fear anything. Fear only God.” And I trusted the words of this man who spent more than twenty years in prison and camps. No power has absolute power over people. We learned that we could resist even the strongest power while maintaining our inner freedom. Sergei Chapnin knows the church from the inside. Former collaborator of Kirill, moderate Orthodox intellectual, critical mind, he directed the patriarchal newspaper and was forced to resign in 2015. The theme of persecution is the common thread in various speeches by Patriarch Kirill. And for him it is important to show that it is not only the history of the country, not only the history of the people, the history of the Church, but also the history of his family. This story of persecution is also the personal story of Patriarch Kirill. The Church, survivor of persecution, is a very important, very strong image to mobilize and call Russians to return to the parishes. Long persecuted, the church was also exploited. From 1943, Stalin, after destroying the church, resurrected it. He needs his support to remobilize the Russian people and troops who are leaving for front against Nazi Germany. At that time 70% of Russians still said they were believers. The church will therefore regain an official existence. A tolerated Church, under state supervision and largely exploited. At the end of the war, alongside the military, the leaders of the clergy paraded before the eyes of Stalin to celebrate the victory. They were now a cog in the Soviet power. But at the end of the 1950s throughout the country, believers and religious people will undergo a new period of repression. Anti-religious propaganda is in full swing and creates images of renunciation of the faith and the priesthood. “why I renounced the faith”
In the Sverdlovsk region, an unusual meeting took place. In front of the inhabitants of the region a former priest of the Mikhailov Church, Alexei Valyaev, who decided to renounce religion . What pushed you to take the plunge? I decided to definitively break my ties with religion and the Church. I was
worried about the people's opinion. But seeing that the majority of Soviet citizens welcomed my gesture,
I was convinced that I was right to break my ties with religion and the Church. At the end of the 1960s, wanting to be a priest meant being ostracized by Soviet society. This is the choice that Kirill will make, just like his father and grandfather. He entered the seminary in 1965. Six years later, noticed by his superiors, he was sent to Geneva to the ecumenical council of churches. In this vast Christian “UN”, a sort of pacifist forum and tool of religious diplomacy, he learned about international relations under the close control of the Soviet state apparatus. In the Soviet Union, as in all communist countries, it was almost impossible, in those years, to be a man of the church, and to have no relationship with political power. The communist political power is the police. That is to say the secret services. In Russia, in the Soviet Union, the KGB. The career of Patriarch Kirill, his career within the Church was dazzling. At the age of 26, 27, he found himself a representative of the Russian Orthodox Church and lived for three years in Geneva. This means that the KGB agreed to his appointment. This would not have been possible otherwise. All delegation members who went abroad, especially the leaders of the delegations, wrote reports to the Council for Religious Affairs and the copy went to the KGB. We can therefore say that Kirill since he was young has been linked, in the literal sense of the term, to the KGB. The question that arises is: was there in this collaboration the betrayal of other people? Did he betray the interests of the Church? These delicate questions can only be answered with suppositions. When Patriarch Kirill was the representative of the Moscow Church in the West to religious organizations, he had little chance of betraying other people... Unlike the priests and church leaders who collaborated with the KGB at the time. The interior of the USSR The KGB: it is the common denominator of a large part of the actors of Russian power, yesterday as today. And during this period in Geneva he was expected... to develop a very precise line of conduct, which was for him a real political school. Undoubtedly, this Soviet past shared with the politicians and civil servants of today gives the patriarch the opportunity to speak the same language as them. Kirill continues his rise. This Soviet world, in which he was built, will disintegrate 20 years later. On the rubble of a post-Soviet Russia, the craze for religion, which began with Perestroika, will continue to grow. The parishes were reopened and in 1988 for the millennium of the founding of Russia, baptisms increased. In the 90s, the church responded to the void, void once again, symbolic, identity-based, moral void, but it did not do so easily because all the intermediate communist apparatuses, in fact, remained profoundly anticlerical, and atheist. SO, the Church must impose itself. Good news is, in fact, Putin's coming to power, because he understood that, in fact, he could not rebuild Russia, to say that communism was basically just an accident , small, but an accident, in the great history of Russia, without the Church, that he could not do it without the Church. From that moment on, a form of alliance was created, but at the top of power. Today, the Russian Orthodox Church has regained all its splendor. And when it celebrates the centenary of the patriarchy, it flaunts itself with the splendor of a church now established and institutionalized. That day, Kirill invited the primates of the 14 churches that make up the galaxy of world Orthodoxy, including Egypt, Canada, Greece, the Czech Republic and the Slovak Republic. Appearing as the one who sets the tone for the Orthodox community is also the ambition on this December day. 400 archbishops, and thousands of believers, But above all it is the prelude to a singular religious and geopolitical event. hello All the Orthodox leaders will be received at the presidential residence of Vladimir Putin, 30 km from Moscow, a sort of Kremlin bis. We are accredited to be willing witnesses of great satisfaction. And for the moment Vladimir Putin is not there yet. Monsignor Savva, are you watching SPASS in Poland? SPASS is a Rarely television channel. Do you have a satellite? No, it's by subscription. Ah, the satellite... Apart from subscription channels, the real subject of the meeting is the defense of persecuted Christians in the Middle East. Kirill's hobby horse. A question that particularly arises in the context of the Syrian conflict. The goals of the Orthodox Church in Syria are firstly to provide support, with its own Russian troops, through the usual pastoral missions, chaplains, troops, and the Russian contingent, and the second mission, to come to support Orthodox Christians and in particular the Orthodox communities in Syria. Without a doubt in Syria after the war, I hope it will be soon, the Russian Orthodox Church will have reconquered positions which could have been shaky for it in the confessional landscape and in the cultural and social landscape of the Syria. Thanks to the help provided to persecuted Christians, Kirill also gained influence over other Orthodox churches and established his power internationally. He then places himself at the center of the game, as the godfather of orthodoxy in the Middle East. There's that for translation... Unfortunately, in this second decade of the 21st century we are once again confronted with what we thought had long been obsolete: religious persecutions and more particularly those concerning Christians. The situation in Syria deserves particular attention. Many Christian churches and monasteries were ransacked and destroyed. The situation in this country is gradually changing. For several years the Russian state, together with the Russian Orthodox Church and other religious organizations, have been providing humanitarian aid to victims in Syria. The protection of Eastern Christians, and the protection of Christian values allows Putin to constitute himself as a protector, as a defender, as a respectable person, and Putin intends to be the man of dialogue, the man of negotiation, and put an end to the characteristics that define him today as a dictator Ten minutes after the start of the meeting, the cameras are asked to go out only to be invited to return two hours later and immortalize another meeting. Should it be removed? Yes, put it here. Behind. A little further, yes. A final television production, with one of the patriarchs, although already present at the previous meeting. That of Antioch, that is to say of Damascus, in Syria. Your Holiness, I am very pleased to meet you face to face. A sequence of two and a half minutes so that the patriarch can pay homage supported Vladimir Putin's Russia. Your Excellency, we thank you very much for the time you gave us with our brother patriarchs, during our meetings. I would like once again to assure you of our deep gratitude, to you, your Excellency and to Russia, for everything you have done and are doing in the Middle East and more particularly in Syria. The fact that Vladimir Putin receives the Patriarch of Damascus reflects the fact that Russian diplomacy, by contrast, wants to appear as that which defends the Christians of the East. And it is obviously a way of reminding the French, and, to a lesser extent, the British, that they have renounced their historic mission. It is also a justification of the Russian intervention in Syria, from September 2016. So it is a very strong theme in fact, it is both diplomacy, but it is a diplomacy which will draw in religious references, and who assumes them completely. The Russian Orthodox Church works hand in hand with Vladimir Putin's government on foreign policy. But not only. When Kirill celebrates his birthday, his guest of honor is Vladimir Putin. An anniversary celebrated with great fanfare and broadcast on Russian television. It's a beautiful day. We here and our millions of viewers celebrate the wonderful seventieth anniversary of our Holiness the Patriarch of Moscow and all Russia… Kirill. You embody the great authority of the Russian Orthodox Church. You are the devoted guarantor of its traditions and the actions of its followers, who played an invaluable role in the affirmation of Christian values as well as in the emergence and development of the Russian state. Beyond birthdays, meetings between the president and the Patriarch are recurring. They see each other almost once a month on average and often in front of the cameras. As far as our relationship with the president is concerned, it is a dialogue about issues that concern us both. I wouldn't call it a tandem. It is truly a dialogue on issues concerning the State and the Church. A dialogue, in a country where Church and State are in principle constitutionally separated but in which the president does not hesitate to publicize his closeness to Kirill and to highlight his Christian faith. For President Putin, the church is also a lever of influence and it is this lever of influence that President Putin will implement by leveraging his proximity to Patriarch Kirill, but also by presenting himself as Orthodox Christian. When he goes, for example, on the day of the Theophany to bathe in the icy waters of Russia which are traditionally blessed to commemorate the baptism of Christ, he does what all Russians do. He has the ability today to be able to speak directly to the Russians because he is like them. Patriarch Kirill has a strong desire to de-secularize Russian society. Its goal is to give the church political, social and even economic power. They both understand perfectly well that they need each other. And they understand that symbolically this link is very important for Putin because it is part of the mechanism of political legitimization of power. And of course this connection is important for Kirill because he needs the support of the state. This support is all the more necessary for Kirill because if 80% of Russians say they are Orthodox, only 4% of the population actually attend parishes. Figures basically quite close to those of the West. The rapprochement between political power and religious power really accelerated when the Kremlin was disturbed by the streets. 1, 2,3 Putin, leave here In the winter of 2011-2012 thousands of people will hit the streets. The wind is rising against the government suspected of fraud in the 2011 legislative elections Russia without Putin! For honest elections!
The protests will last almost 6 months. It is in this context that Pussy Riot, invest the Cathedral of Christ the Savior. They sing their punk and political prayer. A prayer in the style of a revisited Te Deum, against Kirill and especially Vladimir Putin. That bastard better believe in God instead. The Belt of the Virgin will not replace
the demonstrations – The Virgin Mary protests with us. ! . Virgin Mary, Mother of God, chase Putin away. A happening seen millions of times on the internet which, beyond their sentence to 2 years in a penitentiary camp, will have profound repercussions on Russian society. The Lord will punish you.” One day the Lord will punish you.
I think the Pussy Riot affair was a pivotal moment because it was such a high-profile event. An event that was able to shake the entire society with its provocative force . The most important thing about the problem with Pussy Riot is that they said a prayer that says “Mother of God, drive Putin out”. For Putin himself it was so unexpected that in a prayer his name was pronounced, and that it was so unpleasant and unbearable for him… Everyone probably felt that Putin had a harsh and unjustified reaction. The Church was ready to tone it down and not give much importance to these dances. Everything that happened next was a chain reaction after the president's personal humiliation. Two months later, Kirill will bring crowds and mobilize the faithful for a large-scale prayer Kirill We were victims today of an attack incomparable to those of the past.
But this attack is dangerous because blasphemy, sacrilege, contempt of holy places present themselves as a legal manifestation
of individual freedom. This approach, even if it is a microscopic manifestation, has transformed into a large-scale phenomenon which has affected all believers. And Kirill used this pretext to organize this grandiose prayer outside, in front of the Cathedral of Christ the Savior. And show how important and active the Church in Russia is. This great prayer was attended not only by priests from Moscow but also those from other regions, who came by bus. It was all a kind of spectacle put on for one spectator: Putin. The patriarch successfully used the president's annoyance and knew how to make the right decisions to achieve the legislation he wanted. In the Duma, a bill on defending the feelings of believers passed a second reading. Wordings have been changed. We replaced “offense” with “ public actions with the aim of offending”. For these “public actions”, the deputies propose to punish with a penalty of 300,000 rubles or a sentence of up to 1 year in prison. If the offense is committed in a church, the penalty could be up to 500,000 rubles or 3 years behind bars. As a direct consequence of the church's strategy during the Pussy Riot affair, the Duma voted in 2013 to introduce into the Russian penal code a new article on insulting the feelings of believers. Its application has already led to the 3 and a half year suspended prison sentence of a Russian YouTuber, who had played Pokémon in a church. Helped by Vladimir Putin's Parliament, the Orthodox Church therefore succeeds in influencing the debates that agitate Russian society today. Since 2012, the church has made further progress. For example, a law on the teaching of compulsory religious or secular morality in school. Russian legislation is becoming more conservative. There were some changes in the family code , where for example the adoption of children was prohibited for homosexual couples. There were small changes over time that all went in the same direction: the strengthening of the ideological positions of the church. Today in Russia, the defense of these traditional values is the subject of major political communication events. Organized with the assistance of the government. On the Day of Russian National Unity, November 4, Kirill and Vladimir Putin have a ritual, they inaugurate together, a major exhibition which celebrates the Russian nation. An exhibition that begins with a prayer and a kiss This year, the exhibition is dedicated to the future of Russia. Hello, Let me tell you about my project. It is a bioplankton project for water purification. This headset is intended for people who have lost the use of speech. The screen allows them to communicate. We want to show you this large-capacity motorcycle project from the Kalashnikov consortium, which is also developing other projects. We hope that in the first half of next year it can be mass produced. The exhibition on the future is very interesting because it shows a double challenge for Russia, it shows a challenge of modernization, a Russia which must accelerate its pace to catch up, or even surpass the West. This modernization is only possible if it is accompanied by an anchoring in the spiritual values of Russia, the traditional values of Russia. Values strangely highlighted in this exhibition. A film denounces the supposed threats weighing on the Russia of tomorrow. A catastrophic and outrageous picture For the first time in its history, in the middle of the 21st century the number of Muslims will be equal to that of Christians. Muslims who immigrated to Europe will transform state politics and their social relations. In 2050 outsourced pregnancy technology will be developed. Women may not bear children. Men will no longer be necessary for procreation. Fertilization will be made possible using artificial semen created on the basis of female reproductive cells. With a certainty of 80% in a majority of countries, same-sex marriages will be legalized, which will lead to a crisis in the traditional family and a drop in the birth rate.
We must unite the Russian population around power and distance it from the West. For that, there is only one theme which brings together the Church and the power, this was the case between 2012 and 2016, it is the theme of sexuality, playing on the opposition between homosexuals and heterosexuals. . After 2012, after the state started using the theme of gay marriages in its propaganda, anti-European sentiment began to increase. The propagandists presented Russia not as a counterweight to Europe but as the real old Europe. They began to say that Europe had taken the wrong path and that we Russians remained on the right path. But in fact if we look at the figures for everyday behavior, Europeans are much more conservative than Russians. Russia remains the first country in the world for the number of abortions! The reality of Russian society does not matter. What matters is the construction of an identity discourse. Make the West a counter-example, to better make Russia an example. A speech in which the church largely finds itself. When we lived in an atheistic society, we, Orthodox Christians, men of faith, considered that the West was closer to us than our own society. For what ? Because there, we could go to church without hiding. The religious institution was respected. What is happening today is quite the opposite. We see how the West is losing what linked us to it. We stop seeing Western society as a society that shares the same values as us. For Kirill, today opposition with the West involves the promotion of traditional values, it is a way of rediscovering one's identity, but at the same time it is a geopolitical lever, namely that it re-conditions, it restructures alliances, with movements which are not only state movements but also religious and even political movements. around questions of traditional values In December 2016 the patriarch is in France. He improvises a press conference at the Russian seminary in Epinay sous-Sénart. Faced with the media who question him on gay marriage, Kirill recalls his positions. We are not asking for any toughening towards those who have a particular sexual orientation. But we are categorically against the idea of placing them on an equal footing with those who married before God and who gave birth to children and who allow the human race to continue. What is God's plan cannot in any way be corrected by political doctrines or legislation. If Kirill is in France, it is to consecrate the new Orthodox Cathedral of the Holy Trinity, built at the foot of the Eiffel Tower, negotiated directly between Vladimir Putin and Nicolas Sarkozy and entirely paid for by the Russian state for 150 million euros. We see here the confirmation of this alliance between Church and State. The Church, the embassy, the cultural center, it is one and the same complex with diplomatic status. It is in miniature a model of Russia and the Russian Church within it. Coming out of 70 years of communism, what Russia is doing is rebuilding itself and therefore the image of a Russia capable of being back on the international scene goes through orthodoxy, because it is the deepest marker of identity. America in Hollywood, or Coca-Cola, Russia, it has its liturgies, with icon, incense, colorful priest, it's the way in which it is part of history, that's what makes it different Kirill in the West, has two aims, to re-evangelize this West which is in the process of declining. In this idea that it is up to Russia to demonstrate an alternative path to American liberalism. On the other hand, he considers that it is under the jurisdiction of the Moscow Patriarchate that Christians of Russian tradition must now come. Part of the Russian community came for the consecration of the Cathedral. Controlling this diaspora is the other challenge in building this place of worship. This cathedral is a tool of soft power, because it makes it possible to mobilize, to bring together the Russian diaspora, old which comes from the revolution, and new one which comes from the 90s and which is numerous, in Paris. This therefore allows the Orthodox Church and Russian public institutions to mobilize this diaspora within the Russian world and revive the lost unity of the Russian world. It is not a particular demonstration of a presence. No way. There are many Russians in France, many Orthodox, we are obliged to ensure our pastoral mission. Throughout the 20th century, starting with this first Russian immigration after the revolution, we had a church in a garage on Petel Street. Until recent times. Realize it, a garage transformed into a church! In reality, Paris already had a Russian Orthodox cathedral, in the 8th arrondissement. A place taken over by the White Russians after the revolution of 1917. A church, under the supervision of the other great Patriarchate, that of Constantinople. Kirill is the head of the largest Orthodox Church in terms of numbers, but formally, the head of the Orthodox world, he is the Patriarch of Constantinople. This paradox annoys Kirill. Kirill claims to become the leading voice of the Orthodox world in its dialogue with Rome. He would also like all Orthodox Churches to follow him in his proposals regarding moral values, or his international political positions. And the Patriarch of Constantinople is not an ally in this enterprise, he disturbs it. And that's why there is always tension between them. Facing Constantinople, the Patriarch opposes his political and numerical power. But Kirill's weakness is Ukraine. Despite the country's independence in 1991, the Ukrainian church remains attached to the Moscow Patriarchate, of which it represents nearly a third of the flock. However, in recent years some Ukrainian Orthodox have turned away from the church linked to Kirill. When the Maidan Square riots broke out in Kiev in 2014, part of the population wanted to turn ever more towards the West, while the other looked towards Russia. A crisis worsened by the sending of troops in the south of Ukraine by the Kremlin to annex Crimea. Today, there is open war between kyiv and Moscow. Ukraine, a delicate subject for the Patriarch Today, with the situation in Ukraine, the Ukrainian Orthodox could be tempted, in fact, to secede , and establish their own Church. In fact, Putin's aggressive policy could ultimately lead to the creation of a Ukrainian church, which would absorb the Moscow Patriarchate's share in Ukraine. This is a vital, lethal danger for Kirill, and at the same time he cannot bring this dispute into the public arena, it is a taboo subject. The church, which believed it had achieved a perfect union with the State on foreign diplomacy, is confronted here with the limit of the exercise. The interests are antagonistic. Today, 4 years after Maidan, the Ukrainian crisis remains the main unknown for Kirill. And could compromise his dream of influence. Vladimir Putin will be re-elected in a few hours without mystery, the only unknown is the participation rate. Kirill plays his part and encourages Russians to vote. You know the phrase in advertising that says "because I'm worth it"... I mean our people deserve a new and better future. May the Lord preserve Russia! Far from the advertising slogans of large Western firms, Kirill continues his fight: to reestablish a powerful Church, the spearhead of Russian society and a tool of influence in the world. A fight, however, far from being won in a society which remains plural despite everything. , diverse and in reality very infrequent.
