Vatican & Orthodox Leaders Pledge to Revive Spiritual Values in Europe

High-profile sensitive talks between the top Vatican envoy and the Russian Orthodox Church were held this week in Moscow. Despite centuries of long disputes between the two Churches, the representatives were able to identify the common challenge faced by Christians in the 21st century "Post-Christendom" Europe.

The two Churches pledged their cooperation in promoting Christian spiritual values in the lives of individuals, families and societies across the continent and the world.

Representing the Vatican was Cardinal Walter Kasper, President of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, which is the Vatican's office for relations with other Christians. He arrived late on Monday to spend three days in Moscow. He has met with Metropolitan Kirill, the chairman of the Russian Orthodox Church's foreign relations department.

The visit of Kasper comes after the repeated call from Pope Benedict XVI for Christian unity. The Pope has declared that healing the divide between the Roman Catholic and Orthodox churches was one of the top priorities of his papacy when he was elected two months ago.

"We are here to repeat our proposals," Kasper said in an interview carried Wednesday by the Catholic missionary news service AsiaNews. "There must not only be steps by us. Dialogue is always reciprocal."

"We want to see what we can do together, study the possibilities," Kasper said, according to AsiaNews. "There won't be decisive steps but little ones."

On top of the ecumenical significance of the meeting, the Russian Orthodox Church said in a statement after the talks that the parties expressed their understanding that "cooperation between the Orthodox and Catholic churches in consolidating Christian spiritual and moral values...can be especially important now, when the peoples of Europe and the world are suffering a moral crisis."

It added that the Russian Orthodox Church Patriarch Alexy II will not meet Kasper.

Nevertheless, Kasper will continue the dialogue with Orthodox leaders, the Vatican said in a brief statement.

Russia is the world's most populous Orthodox nation, which has around two-thirds Orthodox Christians among the 144 million-strong population. According to the Associated Press, Alexy has said in the past that a papal visit hinged on ending what the Russian Orthodox Church described as Catholic poaching for converts in Russia and other ex-Soviet lands, and discrimination against Orthodox in western Ukraine.

The Vatican has rejected the Orthodox accusations of proselytising. It said it was only ministering to Russia's tiny Catholic community - about 600,000 people, less than 1 percent of the country's total population.