A spokesman for the Moscow Patriarchy of the Russian Orthodox Church said Alexiy, who headed the powerful church for 18 years, died at his residence in Peredelkino outside Moscow.

The Church never commented on Alexiy’s health and did not immediately disclose a cause of death. But diplomats in Moscow had said he was suffering from cancer.

In a sign of his importance, Russian state television immediately ran a film showing highlights from Alexiy’s life, accompanied by the sound of tolling church bells.

“This is an irreplaceable loss for all Russian Orthodox people, wherever they live,” said Sergei Mironov, speaker of the upper house of parliament.

Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia since 1990, the Estonian-born Alexiy was a powerful and influential figure with close links to the Kremlin.

He oversaw a major religious revival in Russia after the collapse of the Soviet Union, with hundreds of new churches built across the country, monasteries reopened and seminaries filling with new priests.

Russia’s Orthodox Church is by far the biggest of the churches in the Eastern Orthodox communion and is the majority religion in Russia.

During his 2000-2008 presidency, Vladimir Putin, a former KGB spy under communism, was often seen with Alexiy attending major religious ceremonies and President Dmitry Medvedev has continued the tradition.

Former Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev said he was “so shocked that it is very hard for me to find words on the spot”, Interfax news agency reported. “I respected him deeply”.

Medvedev, who was on an official visit to India, was expected to make a statement shortly.

Deeply conservative

An unapolegetic conservative, Alexiy was outspoken in his defence of traditional Russian values and was critical of the Catholic church for what he said was its efforts to win converts among Russian Orthodox believers.

He stood in the way of a visit to Russia by the Polish-born leader of the Catholic Church, Pope John Paul II.

Both churches said they were open in principle to an historic meeting between the Russian Patriarch and Pope Benedict, who was elected in 2005. But despite several rounds of dialogue between bishops from both churches, Alexiy felt the obstacles were too great.

“Problems remain on the agenda for our bilateral relations with the Roman Catholic Church which demand real solutions,” Alexiy said in a speech in June to the Council of Bishops.

“Among them is the question of missionary activity of Catholics in traditionally Orthodox Russian lands”.

In a first reaction from the Catholic Church to Alexiy’s death, Bishop Brian Farrel, secretary of the Vatican’s Pontifical Council for Christian Unity, said:

“Patriarch Alexiy had to lead the Church in a period of great transformation. He knew how to carry out this task with a great sense of responsibility and love for Russian tradition.”

The celebrations were attended by a large delegation from the Church of Rome, led by Cardinal Walter Kasper, president of the council for Christian unity, representatives of the other Christian confessions, the diplomatic corps, and various authorities.

Ecumenical patriarch Bartholomew began his homily by recalling the historic meeting in Jerusalem in 1964, between Paul VI and Athenagoras, which put an end to the historic and distasteful schism of 1054 between the two sister Churches, initiating a dialogue of love and truth in full and mutual respect, with the objective of reestablishing full communion. And precisely in order to highlight this journey toward full communion, Bartholomew gave the example of the two brothers “in the flesh,” Andrew and Peter, who later became spiritual brothers in Christ, to emphasize the role that the two sister Churches must play. Although the two brothers Peter and Andrew followed different geographical paths to testify to the truth of Christ our Lord – the former sanctified the Church of Rome with his own blood, while the latter founded the Church of Byzantium, which later became Constantinople – they have remained united in the course of history through the two Churches: Rome and Constantinople.

This connection between the two apostles, Bartholomew continued, the beginning of which was biological in nature, later became a spiritual bond in the name of our Lord, and ended up constituting the bond that unites the Churches. And this bond must always be kept in mind,
continued the ecumenical patriarch, in order to restore full unity. Because today, by honoring the apostle Andrew, one also honors the apostle Peter – it is not possible to think of Peter and Andrew separately. The thorns must therefore be removed which for a millennium have wounded relations between the two Churches, and guidance toward unity must be taken from the spirit of the common tradition of the seven ecumenical councils of the first millennium. And all of this is not only out of respect for our two apostles, Bartholomew concluded, but also because it is our duty toward the contemporary world, which is going through a tremendous
sociopolitical, cultural, and economic crisis. A world that has urgent need of the message of peace, of which the founder of our Church, Jesus Christ, is the messenger, through his cross and
resurrection. Only then will the word of our Church be credible, when it can also give a message of peace and love: “Come and see” (John 1:47).

Cardinal Kasper, as the pope’s representative, also focused in his homily on the importance of dialogue for full unity between the Churches, saying that the same feast is celebrated today in Rome, a sign of our common apostolic heritage, which requires us to work for full communion. Because this ecumenical commitment is not an option, but a duty toward our Lord, in order to be able to consider ourselves an essential part of the Church of Christ, our Lord.

Kasper then cited the three visits of the ecumenical patriarch to Rome in 2008, which included his participation, together with Pope Benedict, in the inauguration of the Pauline year, and his address to the synod of Catholic bishops, also at the invitation of the pope. This reinforced the bonds between Rome and Constantinople. He concluded by speaking of the importance of the document of Ravenna (2007) in the dialogue between Catholics and Orthodox.

Finally, in a conversation with AsiaNews, Cardinal Kasper maintained that the journey with the Orthodox, although it will certainly not be short, has started on the right path, “in part because we have many, many things in common with the Orthodox.” Moreover, Kasper continued, the fact that Constantinople has a very broad vision helps a great deal in the journey of dialogue toward full communion.