Metropolitan Kirill meets with the Mayor of Reykjavik

On 6b July 2007, the Chairman of the Moscow Patriarchate Department for external church relations Metropolitan Kirill of Smolensk and Kaliningrad met with the Mayor of Reykjavik Viljalmur Viljamsson. Taking part in the meeting was Ambassador A. Rannikh, head of the Russian Federation diplomatic mission in Iceland in 2002-05. Reykjavik Mayor handed over to the DECR Chairman an agreement on the allocation of a plot of land to build a Russian Orthodox church in the capital of Iceland.

The participants in the meeting exchanged their views on the development of relations between the Russian Orthodox community and the Reykjavik city council.

Metropolitan Kirill thanked Reykjavik Mayor for supporting the young Orthodox parish. For five years since its registration the number of parishioners has doubled, and the home church of St Nicholas has become a religious centre, coming where to pray are the Orthodox believers who have arrived to Iceland from Russia, Bulgaria, Ukraine, Georgia, Serbia, Slovakia, Romania, the USA and other countries.

The DECR Chairman expressed his hope for the Russian Orthodox church in Reykjavik to serve to the further development of cultural and religious dialogue both between the two capital and the two countries.

The Mayor of the capital of Iceland noted an important role that the Russian community is playing in the adaptation of the Russian-speaking immigrants to Iceland and promised to help with the construction of the Orthodox church.

Metropolitan Kirill presented Reykjavik Mayor and his wife with a folded Icon of the Saviour and His Most Pure Mother.