DECR chairman meets with director of the State Tretyakov Gallery

On 6 December 2010, Metropolitan Hilarion of Volokolamsk, head of the Moscow Patriarchate’s Department for External Church Relations, visited the State Tretyakov Gallery and met with its general director Ms. Irina Lebedeva.

They discussed a wide range of problems of cooperation between the Russian Orthodox Church and the museum community.

Ms. Lebedeva told Metropolitan Hilarion of the preparation of the “Holy Russia” exhibition to be opened in Moscow on 24 May 2011, the Day of Slavic Literature and Culture.

Metropolitan Hilarion spoke of the Church’s efforts to attain complete mutual understanding with the museum community, including, for instance, the setting up of the Russian Orthodox Church’s Commission for cooperation with the museum community at the Patriarch Council for Culture.

Metropolitan Hilarion made a gift of his book “Orthodoxy” in two volumes to Ms. Lebedeva in commemorate their meeting held in a friendly atmosphere.

The DECR chairman visited the Gallery’s hall of old Russia painting and the Church of St. Nicholas in Tolmachy where he venerated the miraculous Vladimir Icon of the Mother of God and other holy objects.