Metropolitan Hilarion meets with Primate of the Orthodox Church of Cyprus

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On June 17, 2011, Metropolitan Hilarion of Volokolamsk, head of the Moscow Patriarchate’s department for external church relations, arrived in Cyprus for a working visit made with the blessing of His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia. He was accompanied by Archpriest Igor Yakimchuk, DECR secretary for inter-Orthodox relations, Mr. L. Sevastyanov, executive director of St. Gregory the Theologian Charity, and Hierodeacon Ioann (Kopeikin), assistant to the DECR chairman.

Metropolitan Isaiah of Tamassos met Metropolitan Hilarion at the Larnaca airport. In the evening that day the hierarchs visited the Stavrovouni Monastery, where the DECR chairman had a talk with the abbot and brethren of the monastery. He venerated the main shrine of the monastery – the cross with a part of the Lord’s Life-Giving Cross, which the Holy Empress Helen Equal-to-the-Apostles brought to the monastery in the 4^th century.

On June 18, Metropolitan Hilarion met with His Beatitude Archbishop Chrysostom of Cyprus at his summer residence near Paphos. They discussed prospects for the development of bilateral relations between the Orthodox Churches of Russia and Cyprus. They considered in particular a possibility for students' exchanges and other forms of cooperation in the field of education, as well as joint cultural projects and increased contacts in the sphere of pilgrimage.

On the same day, His Beatitude Chrysostom and His Eminence Hilarion visited St. Neophytos Monastery to take part in the celebrations on the occasion of the name-day of Bishop Leontios, the abbot of the monastery.

In the afternoon, Metropolitan Hilarion was taken on a tour of the monastery and visited the cave in which St. Neophytos used to stay. There are surviving frescoes in his cell painted as far back as in the saint’s lifetime.

DECR Communication Service

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Metropolitan Hilarion meets with Primate of the Orthodox Church of Cyprus

Patriarch

Department Chairman

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Patriarch

Department Chairman

Sermons