Department for External Church Relations
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Participants in plenary session of Christian Interconfessional Consultative Committee discuss the problem of orphanhood and crisis of family institution
The 4th plenary session of the Christian Interconfessional Consultative Committee took place in St. Petersburg on February 26, 2014. Acting as its moderators were co-chairmen of the Committee: Metropolitan Hilarion of Volokolamsk, chairman of the Moscow Patriarchate’s Department for External Church Relations; Archbishop Paolo Pezzi, head of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of the Mother of God in Moscow; and pastor Vitaliy Vlasenko, chairman of the Department for External Relations of the Russian Union of Evangelical Christians-Baptists.
Among the speakers were Metropolitan Hilarion of Volokolamsk; Auxiliary Bishop Yury Kasabutski of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Minsk-Mohilev, who spoke about projects for rendering assistance to orphans in Belarus; and Mr. Arho Tuhkru, representative of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Estonia, who emphasized that marriage be regarded as a union between man and woman. All speakers, including the representatives of the Protestant Churches, spoke about the importance of traditional understanding of marriage.
The final plenary session summed up the round tables discussions. The participants claimed that Christians should openly express their common opinion on vices of society and feel free to call sin by its right name. Special attention was paid to the problem of re-establishing the traditional understanding of family. The suggestions were made to celebrate the Year of Family, the Day of Family, and the Year of Sanctity of Life (aimed against abortion and euthanasia).
Adopted at the meeting were the Appeal of Participants in the 4th Plenary Session of the Christian Interconfessional Consultative Committee and the Communiqué. The participants in the meeting also issued a statement on the situation in Ukraine.
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