Met. Hilarion (Alfeyev) Meets with North Korean Amabassador
October 08, 2014 (Source:
Originally reported on Oct. 06
On October 6, 2014, Metropolitan Hilarion of Volokolamsk, head of the Moscow Patriarchate’s department for external church relations, received the recently appointed Ambassador of the People’s Democratic Republic of Korea, Mr. Kim Hyong Jun.
The PDRK ambassador noted that the Russian Orthodox Church cherishes the old history and rich culture of the Russian people and occupies a prominent place in Russian society today. He said that “under the guidance of the leaders of the two countries, the relations between Russia and North Korea in the religious sphere are persistently developing. Evidence to it is the Orthodox church of the Life-Giving Trinity built in Pyongyang and consecrated in 2006 by Metropolitan Kirill of Smolensk and Kaliningrad (now His Holiness Patriarch of Moscow and All Russia) as a symbol of Russian-Korean friendship”.
NFTU Editor’s Note:
The North Korean state is perhaps one of most evil of states in modern (or ancient) history. It is a state founded upon the very principles of anti-Christian militant atheism. Yet, Moscow Patriarchate bishops seems to have no issue coming to terms with them; undoubtedly the horrific history of the Sergianist heresy has prepared them for such dealings. In the past, the Orthodox Church generally had fundamentally positive views of many states; this is because, until the modern era, most states had the preservation of civil order, family, etc, as a primary focus. This is why the Church never saw the Roman Empire, despite the 10 Great Persecutions, as fundamentally an evil entity; it was something that was fundamentally good, but was subject to great perversions. The Church’s attitude proved right with the ascension of St. Constantine and the inauguration of Christian Freedom. Even the deprivations and atrocities committed against Orthodoxy by the Ottoman power should not fundamentally be compared in quality or quantity to the objectives of modern political ideologies, especially the Communist Atheist powers, whose sole mission and objective is the destruction of all morality, all belief in God and good, at any means.
This is why there is difference of quality between the dealings of the Church with states in the pre-modern period, and the dealings of the Church with modern, Atheist-Communist ideological states. We see St. Joseph of St. Petersburg and St. Cyril of Kazan and their attitude toward the new Soviet Power of Lenin and the dealings of the fallen Metropolitan Sergius, and his acquiescence to the the principles of atheistic power; surrendering the Church from the inside to atheist destruction.