Word: cyril
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...Cyril, 62, the Metroplitan of Smolensk and Kaliningrad, was elected overwhelmingly on Tuesday as the new head of the Russian Orthodox Church. He arrives at the top job in Moscow with a very long and public resume. He served for nearly two decades as head of the Church's office of external affairs, a kind of roaming secretary of state, the Russian church's ambassador on the world's religious chessboard. (See pictures of the Pope in France...
...Cyril, who'd been serving as interim head of the Church since the Dec. 5 death of Patriarch Alexy II, was particularly adept at keeping warm relations with both Kremlin insiders and religious counterparts outside of Russia. His many contacts with the West, including a meeting in 2007 with Pope Benedict XVI at the Vatican, helped earn Cyril a reputation as a pragmatic reformer who favored moving his Church closer to Catholicism after a millennium-long schism...
Other Catholic leaders hailed the choice of Cyril, who received 508 of the 700 votes cast at Tuesday's balloting among a commission of lay and clergy leaders in Moscow's Christ the Savior Cathedral. He defeated a conservative rival, Metropolitan Kliment. "This was the best result we could have hoped for," said one Rome-based Catholic priest involved in ecumenical dialogue. "He's always been a moderate, and open minded, and now that he's reached the top, he's free to pursue closer ties with [the Vatican]." (See 10 things to do in Rome...
...trip to Rome, Cyril offered a notably conciliatory, though still vague, view of the long-separated sister churches. "Catholics and Orthodox feel that they belong to the same family, since they share the same Christian values," he was quoted as saying by Vatican Radio. "In order to overcome the divisions the most important thing is that the East and the West leave aside considering the other as foreigners...
...Cyril, who has been fulfilling the duties of Patriarch in the weeks since Alexy's death, is a well-known figure among ordinary Russians, with his own radio and television programs. Still, both Kremlinologists and Vaticanisti can agree that there are other factors that may be more important than popular appeal. For one thing, Cyril is on excellent terms with both Vladimir Putin and Dmitry Medvedev...