Idea of Russian world not means of enslaving Ukraine – Patriarch Kirill

Moscow, September 8, Interfax – The idea of a Russian world is not a means of enslaving Ukraine, Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia said.

“However, this concept, the Russian world, outrages our enemies, including the nationalist forces in Ukraine, which are trying to see Russia as an enemy and the Russian world as a horrible political doctrine aimed at restricting the sovereignty of Ukraine and enslavement of Ukraine by Russia,” the patriarch said in his program Slovo Pastyrya (Russian for the Shepherd’s Word – IF) aired on Channel One television.

The patriarch recalled the first Russian chronicle, Tale of Bygone Years, which was written in Kiev and began with the words “Where the Russian land came from.”

“No one in Kiev called themselves Ukrainians, everyone called themselves Russians. That’s what Byzantines called our ancestors: Russians,” the patriarch said.

The patriarch said the Russian world is not the world of the Russian Federation or the Russian Empire, but it “comes from the Kievan Christianization.”

“The Russian world is a special civilization, which comprises people who now call themselves different names: Russians, Ukrainians, and Belarusians. This world may also include people who do not belong to the Slavic word at all, but who have taken the cultural and spiritual component of this world as their own,” the patriarch said.

Patriarch Kirill said this civilization is centered around Evangelical values or, for those who do not accept the Gospel and belong to other religions, the values of their own religions “that largely overlap the Gospel values in terms of morals.”

“This religious dimension of the Russian world is a source of our people’s love of peace. It’s not easy to keep these values now. But we should understand that the people of Russia, Ukraine or Belarus would not exist without these values, but would be melted in some civilization pan,” the patriarch said.

The patriarch reiterated that the Russian world needs to be preserved “to keep the greatest heritage that we received from our ancestors, not to re-create some political constructions, build new empires and create military blocs.”

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