![](\"https:\/\/old.mospat.ru\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/09\/IMG_37101.jpg\")
<\/a>![](\"https:\/\/old.mospat.ru\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/09\/IMG_3700.jpg\")
<\/a>![](\"https:\/\/old.mospat.ru\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/09\/IMG_3703.jpg\")
<\/a>![](\"https:\/\/old.mospat.ru\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/09\/IMG_3704.jpg\")
<\/a>![](\"https:\/\/old.mospat.ru\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/09\/IMG_3707.jpg\")
<\/a>![](\"https:\/\/old.mospat.ru\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/09\/IMG_3709.jpg\")
<\/a>![](\"https:\/\/old.mospat.ru\/wp-content\/uploads\/2012\/09\/IMG_3710.jpg\")
<\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t<\/i><\/a>\n\t\t\t<\/i><\/a>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t<\/div>\nOn September 25, 2012, Metropolitan Hilarion of Volokolamsk, head of the Moscow Patriarchate\u2019s department for external church relations and rector of the Sts Cyril and Methodius Post-Graduate and Doctoral School, arrived in Kiev, with the blessing of His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Upon his arrival, he visited the St. Panteleimon Monastery in Feofania, where he met with His Beatitude Vladimir, Metropolitan of Kiev and All Ukraine.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
In the afternoon the DECR chairman took part in the work of the 12th<\/sup> International Assumption Readings held on the theme \u2018Witness: Traditions, Forms, Names\u2019. He presented a paper on \u2018Martyrdom as Witness: On New Martyrs and Today\u2019s Persecution against Christians\u2019.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n In his presentation, Metropolitan Hilarion noted in particular that \u2018for Christians, martyrs are first of all confessors of the faith\u2026 Martyrdom is daily and hourly witness to Christ\u2019. His Eminence reminded the participants that the new martyrs of the 20th<\/sup> century became true successors of the early martyrs.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n He drew the participants\u2019 attention to the fact that \u2018today we experience again a new wave of hate towards Christianity\u2026. Acts of vandalism against our shrines have been committed both in Russia and Ukraine\u2019. He underscored that today \u2018Christians in many parts of the world have experienced hardships and shed blood for their right to live freely according to God\u2019s commandments and to be named followers of Christ\u2019.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n A considerable part of Metropolitan Hilarion\u2019s presentation was devoted to a description of the situation concerning the persecution against Christians in the Middle East countries and the actions undertaken today by the Russian Orthodox Church to help relieve their suffering. His Eminence noted in particular that \u2018today Orthodox Christians in the countries united by the notion of Holy Rus\u2019, first of all Ukraine and Russia, bear a great historical responsibility for the fate of their brothers and sisters in the Middle East\u2019.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n In conclusion of his presentation, Metropolitan Hilarion called the listeners to pray for the persecuted brothers in the faith \u2018so that the All-Merciful Lord may give those who suffer and are persecuted hope and consolation, so that they, feeling the help and compassion coming from their geographically remote but spiritually close brothers and sisters, may through God\u2019s grace find strength to continue walking along the path of steadfastness in the faith\u2019.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n During the Readings, Metropolitan Hilarion met with some participants including Prof. Archimandrite John Manoussakis of the Holy Cross college in Massachusetts, USA, A. Filonenko, associate professor at the Karazin National University, and V. Khromts, associated professor of the Dragomanov Pedagogic University in Kiev.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n DECR Communication Service<\/em><\/p>\n <\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Upon his arrival, he visited the St. Panteleimon Monastery in Feofania, where he met with His Beatitude Vladimir, Metropolitan of Kiev and All Ukraine.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":71301,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1,12],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/old.mospat.ru\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71282"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/old.mospat.ru\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/old.mospat.ru\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/old.mospat.ru\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/old.mospat.ru\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=71282"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/old.mospat.ru\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71282\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/old.mospat.ru\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/71301"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/old.mospat.ru\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=71282"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/old.mospat.ru\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=71282"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/old.mospat.ru\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=71282"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}