The Russian Orthodox Church compares divergence with liberal Protestants to "bottomless abyss"

09 June 2008, 14:38

Moscow, June 9, Interfax - Not all participants of the inter-Christian dialogue are ready to pursue partnership and solidarity, Bishop Hilarion of Vienna and Austria, Representative of the Russian Orthodox Church to the European Institutions, said.

"The divergence is so deep, that it can be compared to bottomless abysses," Hilarion said in his interview to the Soyuznoye Veche, the newspaper of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Union of Belarus and Russia, commenting his dialogue with a Lutheran bishop.

According to Hilarion, the bishop refused to recognize abortion as a sin in a joint document, whereby he expressed "a more liberal approach to this challenge" as compared to the position of the Moscow Patriarchate.

"If we fail to reach consensus even on such matters which are seemingly obvious to all Christians, what can we do about other challenges?" Bishop Hilarion said.

According to him, many Protestant communities are experiencing the "radical liberalization of morals" during the last decades, when, for example, the same-sex union is considered a marriage, and members of sexual minorities are ordained bishops.

"It's not just apostasy, it is sacrilege! Neither Orthodox, nor Catholic Church can accept such drastic perversion of the Christian moral teaching," Bishop Hilarion believes.

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