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On July 19, 2011, after his meeting with His Beatitude Daniel, Patriarch of Romania, Metropolitan Hilarion, head of the Moscow Patriarchate’s department for external church relations, made the following statement for the press:

‘I have come to Bucharest with the blessing of His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia to meet with His Beatitude Patriarch Daniel and discuss with him a broad range of issues involved in the bilateral cooperation between our Churches. We had a substantial two-hour talk in which we considered a whole number of problems.

We discussed the general theme of Orthodox witness in today’s world and the ways in which Orthodox Churches should build their mission in the secular society of today, particularly in the countries where the communist regime existed for a long time and now has ceased to exist. We exchanged opinions on how our two Churches should participate in inter-Orthodox relations including the preparations for a Holy and Great Council of the Orthodox Church.

We could not avoid the complex issues on the agenda of our bilateral relations, particularly the problem concerning the activity of the Metropolia of Bessarabia. In the talk with His Beatitude Patriarch Daniel, I underscored that his problem, unfortunately, had not been removed from our agenda. Nevertheless, despite its existence, we should broaden our cooperation in various areas, for instance, in students’ exchanges and cultural exchanges. We should also discuss on the bilateral level the problem of pastoral care for our faithful who reside in various countries.

I am very much satisfied with the results of our meeting and hope that it will contribute to further strengthening of relations between our two Churches and solution of the problems which still darken our relations’.

DECR Communication Service