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The Vatican’s most senior diplomat began a visit to Russia on Monday, aimed at maintaining dialogue with Moscow against a background of particularly tense international relations.
Archbishop Paul Richard Gallagher, Secretary for Relations with States, is the most senior Vatican official to visit the country since the start of the Russian full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
Gallagher will hold talks on Tuesday with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.
The programme for his visit, which is due to last until Thursday, includes meetings with representatives of the Moscow Patriarchate and with the small, local Catholic community.
This visit, his first since November 2021 before the conflict in Ukraine broke out in February 2022, is in keeping with the Vatican’s diplomatic tradition, which emphasises active neutrality and a refusal to break contact with parties to a conflict.
The Holy See is promoting humanitarian moves from the two sides such as prisoner exchanges or the repatriation of Ukrainian children while exploring opportunities for peace negotiations.
However, bilateral ties are delicate, particularly due to the alignment of the Orthodox Church and Patriarch Kirill with the Kremlin.
A comment made by the late Pope Francis in 2022 further soured relations, when he told the Italian daily Corriere della Sera that the Patriarch should not be Putin’s “altar boy.”
In July, the Vatican’s envoy to Ukraine, Italian cardinal Matteo Zuppi, went to Kyiv where he conveyed a message of solidarity from Pope Leo XIV and met with Russian prisoners.
Diplomatic efforts to put an end to the four and a half years of conflict in Ukraine have stalled with both sides having stepped up their attacks in recent weeks, leading to a rising number of civilian casualties.
After Gallagher, Zuppi may also head to Moscow
Gallagher’s mission may also not be the only step by Vatican diplomacy towards Moscow.
Russia’s ambassador to the Holy See, Ivan Soltanovsky, said recently that Moscow is preparing a new invitation for Cardinal Matteo Maria Zuppi, who has already visited the Russian capital in 2023 and 2024.
According to Soltanovsky, that visit could take place in September.
Additional sources • AFP
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