Church leaders welcome new Orthodox patriarch: Patriarch Kirill I
Ecumenical leaders have welcomed the election of Metropolitan Kirill of Smolensk and Kaliningrad as the 16th patriarch of Moscow and of all Russia and expressed hopes of greater church unity under his leadership.
The 62-year-old became Patriarch Kirill I after being elected by an overwhelming majority of a council of the entire Russian Orthodox Church on January 27 in Moscow’s Christ the Savior Cathedral.