Vatican City, Aug 3, 2017 / 06:01 am (CNA/EWTN News).- The Vatican Secretary of State’s visit to Russia later this month comes at a crucial juncture for the country, and is packed with both political and religious significance.
He is expected to meet with President Vladimir Putin and leaders of the Russian Orthodox Church during the trip.
On a political level, the visit of Cardinal Pietro Parolin – the dates of which have yet to be announced – comes as Russia faces rising tensions with the West over Syria and Ukraine, and possible meddling in the 2016 U.S. presidential election.
Just this week the U.S. slapped Russia with more economic sanctions due to Russia’s involvement in the election. The decision prompted Putin to expell 755 people from its U.S. embassy and consulates.
On a religious level, Cardinal Parolin’s visit also comes at a key time, falling just a year and a half after the historic February 2016, meeting between Pope Francis and Patriarch Kirill of Moscow, head of the Russian Orthodox Church.
The meeting marked the first time leaders from each Church sat down together since the Russian Orthodox Church was founded some 400 years ago.
While there might be fear and criticism regarding their engagement with Russia, “the Vatican is nevertheless willing to take this risk,” seasoned Vatican analyst Robert Moynihan told CNA.
“On the world scene there is no more important and more significant relationship right now than that between Russia and the West,” he said. So for the Vatican “to bring the highest diplomatic figure to the center of Russia and to have him speak with the highest authorities is a dramatic and significant gesture on the part of Pope Francis.”
“The benefit of direct contact and of sitting and talking is so great, and the threat of wider conflict in Ukraine and of deeper division between the West and Russia is viewed in Rome as so dangerous, that the Vatican … is willing to publicly make this trip and underline the fact that they have hope that these types of talks can lessen tensions,” he said.
“So this is the delicacy of the moment. I think it’s a courageous act on the part of the Vatican.”
Moynihan is an American journalist and is the editor-in-chief of Inside the Vatican magazine. Holding a Ph.D in Medieval Studies from Yale University, he is also founder of the Urbi et Orbi Foundation, which is dedicated to building relations between Catholics and other Christians throughout the world.
Throughout his career he has taken a special interest in Russia, having traveled there some 30 times since 1999.
Moynihan said the significance of Cardinal Parolin’s visit and the meetings he will hold have deep historical roots, making the trip a pivotal moment not only for the present, but also in terms of what the future could look like.
Political Relevance
Quoting an Oct. 1, 1939, BBC broadcast with Winston Churchill, Moynihan said Russia “is a riddle wrapped in a mystery inside an enigma.” As such, it’s something “difficult to penetrate, to understand, [and] is a fascinating and important country.”
Russia is “a country that we should not put into a corner and condemn, but a country we should engage with and a country which can teach us many things,” he said.
In many ways still grappling with the dissolution of the Soviet Union, Russia is in a sense trying to find its place, he said, adding that the complexity of the current situation has been triggered at least in part by the events that followed the fall of the Iron Curtain.
Among these events are the re-unification of Germany, the integration of Eastern bloc countries into Europe, and current questions on Russia’s own integration into Europe and what role border countries – namely the Baltic states and others such as Belarus and Ukraine – will play.
Looking specifically to Ukraine, Moynihan pointed the severity of the situation, and noted that most Ukrainians would sadly recognize that the democratic process in their country is going though “an extremely difficult transition period.”
This is due largely to the conflict in the eastern region of the country, which has killed more than 10,000 people since April 2014, and crippled their economy.
With Cardinal Parolin’s visit, the Holy See will have the opportunity to play a similar role to the one it had in helping to broker restored ties between the U.S. and Cuba during the Obama administration, leading to the thaw of a 50 year freeze in relations.
Part of this mediation could come through the Catholic Church’s close ties with the Ukrainian Greek Catholic Church, which is 4-5 million people strong in a country of 40 million, and with the Latin and Orthodox communities in Ukraine.
“I’ve always thought there could be a religious off-ramp that could cut through the geopolitical and political haggling and distrust to say we are all human beings, we all have the faith in God and in Jesus Christ,” and even with differences, are able to go beyond “this geopolitical conflict,” Moynihan said.
In looking at the situation between Russia and Ukraine from both the religious and geopolitical sides, the Vatican recognizes “that it’s always good to have channels of communication open,” he said.
“The idea that the Vatican and that Cardinal Parolin himself continually emphasize that it’s better to communicate and to talk than to be in a cold, non-communicative standoff.”
Religious Relevance
Cardinal Parolin’s expected meeting with Patriarch Kirill comes as part of what Moynihan termed “a longing” to restore at least partial, if not full, unity among the Catholic and Eastern Orthodox Churches.
Since the 1964 meeting of Bl. Paul VI and Patriarch Athenagoras of Constantinople, the two traditions have reached a point “where the profound suspicion and distrust of some past centuries has diminished by the hard work of thoughtful men of both Churches as they’ve come to respect and appreciate the faith and learning of their counterparts.”
There are still those in the Orthodox community who view Rome with suspicion, believing them to be a controlling entity that would limit their freedom and strip them of their traditions. On the other hand, many in the Latin rite hesitate to draw closer to the Orthodox for fear that they are often closely linked with their governing states.
According to Moynihan, many fear that the meeting between Cardinal Parolin and Putin would be used “as a piece in a chess game for geopolitical purposes,” to make Russia seem less aggressive.
“The Vatican is nevertheless willing to take this risk,” he said, because they have hope the meeting might help “prepare the way for a just peace in situations of conflict and for closer union between these thousand year-divided Churches.”
Turning to the days of St. John Paul II, Moynihan noted that the Polish Pope, who was very familiar with Russia and the Soviet regime, had said that “the Church needs to breathe with two lungs, that we need to have closer relations with the Orthodox.”
Russian Orthodox themselves were “brutally and cruelly suppressed” under the Soviet Union, he said, noting that thousands of churches were burned, many thousands of Orthodox Christians were arrested, and hundreds of priests executed.
“The atheist, communist regime was a brutal regime for our Christian brothers in the Soviet Union and in Russia, so I think this is a cause for us to feel compassion toward them,” Moynihan said.
When faced with accusations that the Russian Orthodox Church is nationalistic and is being used as a puppet of the government, the journalist said he insists that, in his opinion, the Russian government “is attempting to become more of a normal country’s government.”
“It’s in reaction to the ideological rigor of the communist system that they are still torn by the mixture of nostalgia for the Soviet time and the attraction of this Western, liberal democratic culture.”
“They’re right in the middle of this transition process,” he said, noting that in recent years they have been rebuilding their churches and re-studying Christian tradition.
In his opinion, Moynihan said efforts are those of a people trying to return to the “wellspring of faith” that was cut off for 70 years by “a very pitiless, tyrannical, atheist regime.”
“For this reason I feel up and down the line we ought to engage with the Russians and with all Eastern Europeans, and that we should gain from them a sense of how Christians can survive under cultural and political pressure as we ourselves face our own challenges in our increasingly post-Christian Western societies.”
In this sense, Cardinal Parolin’s visit marks “one more step in a multi-decade, multi-century process in which the Church tries to keep communications with the Eastern Churches.”
One point Cardinal Parolin and Patriarch Kirill are likely to touch on in their upcoming meeting is the joint declaration signed by the Patriarch and Pope Francis during their meeting in Havana last year, which highlighted the need to work together to protect the environment, the poor, and the persecuted.
But odds are, when he meets with Putin, Cardinal Parolin will try to move the political pen on touchy issues, reinforcing the idea that the Holy See “can serve as a type of honest broker in between colossal powers, which are as we all know positioning themselves in very significant ways that will effect the future of Ukraine, the future of Eastern Europe, the future of Europe as a whole and the future of the world.”
So it is against this political and religious backdrop that Cardinal Parolin will enter “right at the hinge-point of this decision, of whether we will keep Russia excluded from polite society, whether we will actually confront Russia and have a conflict or a war,” Moynihan said.
“This is a dramatic moment, and I wish Cardinal Parolin all the best. I think he’s a balanced, competent, thoughtful man,” he said, but noted that there are still those who are concerned, wishing to keep Russia isolated on the global playing field.
“I take a different view,” he said. “I think it’s a trip that’s filled with hope and is something that must be done in order to allow us to evade, if we may evade, a great tragedy of wider conflict that could harm the entire region and the world.”
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I think the article has one glaring omission: the thug regime of Biden and his comrades in arms – the bishops of the USA, the Vatican, and the USCCB – all supporters of this abortion-promoting dictatorship.
I agree. Indeed, I thought it was going to be about the Biden govt. It is an excellent article on a topic not usually discussed at all but further comment is suggested on Biden’s govt, combining appeasement as a foreign policy with bullying (the heart of thuggery) as a domestic policy.
Pope Francis dialogues with dictators but refuses to clarify his confusing remarks to the faithful and refuses to answer the Dubia.
Good article. I can think of another thug regime which wants to codify the legalization of unrestricted abortion. And at this juncture, the Vatican appears to be quite content to accommodate it.
“A Church that will not speak truth to power is not a Church that can credibly proclaim Jesus Christ,…” Bravo Mr Weigel! But this declaration begs the question of why Vatican 2 was mute on the problem of Communism. Although V2 is sixty years in the past, its silence on the evils of Communism, Paul VI’s and Bergoglio’s compliance to the dictators, shows the enduring deep reticence– indeed skepticism–within the highest levels of the Church on its teaching mission to the poor slaves within the totalitarian prisons.
Not so. Pope John Paul was clear about communism, particularly as he had suffered atheistic totalitarian govt under Hitler and then the Soviets. I wish he were still in the Holy See but one cannot live forever. Remember Cardinal Mindszenty, whom John Paul received upon his release from the communists, who had been so excruciatingly tortured. There was no backing down there by the Vicar of Christ at that time.
Great article, George. May God assist us during this dark time within the Church, where it’s leadership seeks first the kingdoms of this world rather than the kingdom of Jesus Christ.
“Thug” is just too nice a term to describe this international phenomenon. This is the spirit of the anti-Christ. The conversation we must have is whether we oppose or embrace them. There is no middle ground. IMO the Pope has CHOSEN to support the anti-Christ and compromise the mission of the church.
The Pontiff Francis orchestrated idolatry in Rome in October 2019, brazenly showing his contempt for the 1st Commandment, after 6 years of showing his contempt for the 6th Commandment.
As reluctantly admitted by Father Imbelli in his recent essay “No Decpaitated Body” (published in summer 2020 in the journal Nova et Vetera, see link below) “there is abroad [i.e., abroad throughout the Church] a…quite intentional apostasy.” He was quoting his own words first written in 2000, and the ellipsis I use are in place of the “limiting qualifiers” which in 2020 he admitted must be deleted. He instead alluded to the 1975 observation by Henri de Lubac, of “the vast phenomenon of the Church’s self-destruction and inner apostasy.”
https://stpaulcenter.com/02-nv-18-3-imbelli/
The leaders of the Church, with few exceptions, cannot taken seriously right now. They do not have the voice of Christ The Good Shepherd.
If the Church in Germany is a 99% wreck, which it is, we ought not to be surprised when public apostate Bishops like Walter Kasper were made Cardinals by Pope John Paul II. In 1974, Kasper outright denied the bodily resurrection of Jesus, and numerous miracle accounts attested by the eye-witnesses of the Church and her evangelists.
The Church has proven itself over the last 50 years to be poorly ungoverned and seemingly ungovernable.
Real reform would be signalled by restoring the primacy of the Congregation for the Faith and dismantling and demoting the Vatican Secretariat of State, made supreme by Pope Paul VI in 1970, (demoting the Congregation for the Faith), and made a super-power by the Pontiff Francis.
But the trajectory of the Church since 1970 has veered away from the Faith, and instead, embraced world politics and power.
The results are the undeniable “vast self-destruction and inner apostasy,” personified by the Pontiff Francis.
A church that demotes the Faith to 2nd place (Paul VI in 1970) and now 3rd tier (Pontiff Francis reorganization) is sending a message that faith doesn’t really matter much to the leadership.
And thus…we are facing a choice between Jesus and the the Church leadership, who are the vanguard of “the vast apostasy.”
Another wonderful article by George Weigel. Gosh, your last 5 or so have been fabulous. I am now a Weigel convert. Time to look on Amazon. But please, you must do this: you have to get a new mugshot. The picture is just way too smug looking, but your writing is not smug at all. The picture just does not match the tone of the writing, which is controlled, professional, no sarcasm or cynicism, no whining, no hyperbole, not a whiff of arrogance, etc., and it is very hard to find Catholic writers who can pull that off today. You are one of the few. Take the plunge: send CWR a nice picture of you smiling, without the pseudo-Rodin posture, giving the false impression that you are looking down at the rest of us ignoramuses from on high.
I had assumed that Mr. Weigel was photographed playing chess, and had just noticed that his opponent had made a careless move.
I like that photograph! George Weigel is a very thoughtful man and that’s what it shows to me. (A lot more than thoughtful, for sure!) The plight of our Church and the world weighs heavily on his shoulders.
What a great article so forthright and true!!! Thank you George Weigel!!
Deacon Peter Kelly
A good account of non productive policy. That granted, if “informed Catholics and senior churchmen” are virtually unanimous, the account begs the question of motive. We may defend such a burlesque as the Vatican claim they secured the right to appoint bishops, when the CCP first selects all the candidates as an only remaining resort to avoid extinction. G Weigel alludes to Vatican financial troubles the CCP renowned for using cash donations as policy incentive. Weigel rightly and righteously responds to either or with, “A Church that will not speak truth to power is not a Church that can credibly proclaim Jesus Christ”. Image is vital appearances must be kept so speaks Madison Avenue. Perhaps the rationale for a makeover Vatican Dicastery for Communications [should I with bias add here the charade claim of doctrinal integrity in Vatican acquiescence to open season communion Malta, Sicily, the Philippines, Deutschland? Okay I won’t]. However it pans out the world will likely give a wink and a nod at a so pretentious Vatican burlesque politik. We simply cannot reconfigure Christ’s radical unmistakable portrait.
“Critical voices among bishops and cardinals may be muted now, out of loyalty (or fear).” This is a very sad (but true) comment on our bishops. And then, “But they are there, and they will be heard when a papal interregnum permits candor.” I see no reason at all to believe this will happen.
The pope decided to allow the communists some voice in appointing Bishops in a misguided attempt to make the situation there better for the church.It did not. If anything it allowed the communists a credibility they did not have before. Having discovered it was false promises ( churches demolished, church goers arrested, etc) the Pope should have pulled the plug on the deal. In the US and elsewhere he seems to operate on the same principle, being fearful that applying truth and discipline will result in insurrection and/or folks voting with their wallets. Well,the church is already teetering and the wallets have been shut for some time.The unwillingness of the Bishops to speak out well before the election was a major disappointment. That many Catholics betrayed their teachings and voted for pro-abortion Biden is just as sad. Lack of firm statements from the hierarchy has much to do with this. Time for the Pope ( and the Bishops) to tell people the plain truth, whether or not they want to hear it. Or resign and allow a pope with more spine to be elected and LEAD .A smaller more faithful church might not be the end of the world. If you want to live the secular life in all ways, and be told that’s fine, there is not much point in being a Catholic or a Christian. Don’t pretend you are one if you are NOT.
I, too, was disappointed that a number of bishops were silent before the election, while simultaneously placing covid restrictions on Mass in direct violation of canon laws and basic rights. It’s like in the past year we’ve been hit with a double-whammy. And so many useful idiots are now emboldened. I definitely feel like my Church is being pushed to the brink.
The interregnum will be predominantly Bergoglio appointees. They like what Francis is doing. That’s why they got the gig. Why would they see the need to address these issues? I suspect most are in tow with Germany, prefer to appease China, follow Francis’ deplorable example on sex abuse, don’t understand how economies function, would rather cower before depots, and see no need to stand for our Catholic faith, to wit, how they deal with Biden. Pipe dreams, Weigel. This Jesuit has done incredible damage to the Church for generations to come.
The fault of all this trouble in the Church goes back to the Second Vatican Council. St. Pope John XXlll had 9 excellent Schemata prepared for the Council. The Council would have been as great as the Council of Trent. Pope John’s Council could have been called The Second Council of Trent. I quote here from the book “Letters from Vatican City” by Xavier Rynne This is when Cardinal Bea led the Council Fathers to dump the Council of Pope John XXlll, words of Cardinal Bea, “There is no need now for patristic or theological arguments. What our times demand is a pastoral approach, demonstrating the love and kindness that flow from our religion… it is not the Councils business to do the work of exegetes; to solve problems of inspiration, authorship or inerrancy.. The Schemata must be radically redone to render it shorter clearer and more pastoral”. This was the beginning of the Modernist takeover of the Church. St. John XXlll after this, “He called his closest Cardinal Collaborators together to think of a way to gracefully end the Council as he saw trouble ahead.” This from an interview I saw on TV about 15 years ago of an aged Cardinal who was one of Pope John’s closest collaborators. God speed to Archbishop Vigano.
Wonderful article Mr. Weigel. You always manage to be insightful, clear, balanced and charitable. I wish I could say the same about some of the comments that follow your articles!
One longs for the days of Pius XII and the excommunication of the miscreant thugs and the proscription of those not Catholic. Whether it eventually brought their souls to truth is uncertain but it is certain that the moral position of the Church was quite clear.