• Home page
  • News
  • Cardinal Parolin, Vatican Secretary of State to Visit Russia Next Month...

Cardinal Parolin, Vatican Secretary of State to Visit Russia Next Month

25.07.2017, 15:02
“I go to Russia as a collaborator of the Pope, who wants to build bridges to make grow the capacity to understand one another and to dialogue,” says Cardinal Pietro Parolin.

“I go to Russia as a collaborator of the Pope, who wants to build bridges to make grow the capacity to understand one another and to dialogue,” says Cardinal Pietro Parolin.

The Vatican Secretary of State presented his forthcoming trip to Russia, scheduled for the month of August, with these words, reported Vatican Radio. While the dates of the trip are still unknown, there will be a meeting with Russian President Vladimir Putin in the program.

“I will allow myself to be guided by the Spirit,” revealed the Cardinal, in an interview for the special broadcast “Francis, the Pope of Dialogue,” produced by Rai Vatican and dedicated to the Pope’s 19 international apostolic journeys.

“In the case of Russia, to build bridges consists in sharing the bilateral relations that already exist and that touch the activity of the Catholic Church and dialogue with the Orthodox Churches. However, it will be impossible not to address the context of international activities where Russia has an active presence, such as the subject of the Middle East and Syria or Ukraine, country that I went to last year,” explained the Vatican’s “Number 2.”

Cardinal Parolin’s trip to Russia follows a meeting between Pope Francis and the Russian Orthodox Patriarch Cyril in February 2016, in Cuba. It was a historic meeting that the Pope described as a “gift of God,” and a “day of grace.”

During the interview, Cardinal Parolin reflected also on the Holy See’s diplomatic activity, stressing the importance of dialogue. “Dialogue means encounter, knowledge, understanding. To put oneself in the other’s place, to understand his point of view. To find areas of coincidence and collaboration,” he said.

The Pope seeks to open new avenues of fraternity. He is going to touch man’s heart” and “insists very much on personal conversion and on the meaning of mercy, which can also have a therapeutic function in relations between peoples and countries,” explained the Cardinal.