Russian and Italian media reported this week that Pope Leo XIV will meet with Metropolitan Anthony of Volokolamsk, envoy of the Russian Orthodox Church, on Saturday, July 26.
A “metropolitan” is a high-ranking bishop in the Russian Orthodox hierarchy. Metropolitan Anthony, born Anton Yurievich Sevryuk, has been chairman of the Department for External Church Relations of the Russian Orthodox Church since 2022, a position regarded as second only to the Patriarch of the church.
Anthony met with Pope Leo’s predecessor, the late Pope Francis, at the Vatican in July 2024, shortly after the pope expressed his “great sorrow” over Russia’s bombing of a children’s hospital in Kyiv.
Pope Francis had long hoped to meet with Patriarch Kirill, head of the Russian Orthodox Church, for a second time to follow up on their historic first meeting in Cuba in 2016, but a second meeting evidently became impossible as Russia prosecuted its brutal war on Ukraine.
Russia’s state news agency RIA was the first to report on a planned meeting between Pope Leo and Metropolitan Anthony at the Vatican on Saturday. Italian news agency ANSA confirmed the report on Tuesday.
ANSA’s sources said Pope Leo hoped to “relaunch dialogue with the Moscow Patriarchate following tension linked to the Russian invasion of Ukraine.”
The Kyiv Independent did not seem enthusiastic about that prospect in its own report on Tuesday, fearing the pope would be dragged into Russia’s campaign to accuse the Ukrainians of religious intolerance:
During a call between the pope and Russian President Vladimir Putin on June 4, the Kremlin urged the Vatican to “take a more active role” in defending what it described as freedom of religion in Ukraine, particularly for the Moscow-linked Ukrainian Orthodox Church.
Russia has repeatedly accused Ukraine of suppressing religious freedom due to its ban on the activities of the Moscow-linked church, which Kyiv accused of continued ties to Russia during the full-scale war. It is not to be confused with the autocephalous (autonomous) Orthodox Church of Ukraine.
“The Russian Orthodox Church is seen as closely tied to the Russian government, and Patriarch Kirill has repeatedly voiced support for Russia’s all-out invasion of Ukraine,” the Kyiv Independent noted.
Pope Leo met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky two weeks ago to discuss the war. According to the Vatican, the pope “expressed his sorrow for the victims of the war” and “encouraged efforts aimed at the release of prisoners and the recovery of children who have been separated from their families.”
Pope Leo repeated his offer to host Ukrainian and Russian representatives at the Vatican for peace talks – an offer Moscow has rejected, because the Vatican is “surrounded” by Italy, a member of the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and critic of the Russian invasion.
“The Vatican definitely is not seen in Russia as a serious force capable of resolving such a complex conflict,” a senior Russian official said in May.
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