Exactly 20 years ago, on March 15th 1990, the then Soviet Union and the Vatican established diplomatic relations. Russia confirmed the agreement two years later.
Russia and the Vatican demonstrate similar views on urgent international issues and favor cooperation between different cultures and religions in humanitarian issues. Diplomatic contacts between Russia and the Vatican began in the 15th century to reconcile the Catholic Church with the Orthodox and thereby unite the main Christian confessions. Since then ties with the Vatican continued to develop with more or less intensity, and central on the agenda was a dialogue between the Roman Catholic and the Russian Orthodox Churches. In the estimates of Metropolitan Ilarion, who presides in the International Relations Department of the Moscow Patriarchate, the dialogue between the two churches has been gaining strength:
"Russia's relations with the Vatican improved dramatically after the enthronement of Pope Benedict XVI. Problems have been reported in Western Ukraine, where more than 500 parishes were taken from the Orthodox believers to be returned to the Greco-Catholics because they had been Greco-Catholic until 1946. As a result, many Orthodox believers ended up without parishes. This problem should have been solved in a more civilized way. This issue is still a major obstacle towards a meeting between the pope and the patriarch. But this meeting will take place sooner or later".
Relations between Russia and the Vatican are unimaginable without cultural exchanges. A large number of Russian performers have visited the Vatican with concerts since the 1990s. Among them are Mikhail Pletnev's and Valery Gergiev's Orchestras, the Moscow Choir led by Viktor Popov, the Alexandrov Ensemble and young talents of Russia who won scholarships of the "New Names" Charitable Foundation.
This year the Russian Orthodox Church and the Vatican are launching a joint project. The project, "Three Romes", marks a cultural unification of Christians and features a series of concerts by the Moscow Synodal Choir, which was re-created recently and blessed by Patriarch Kirill. The Choir is playing its first concert in the Papal Palace in Vatican City on May 20th. On the program are classical pieces and religious music.
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