Metropolitan Kirill of Smolensk and Kaliningrad was overwhelmingly elected Patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church in a secret ballot Jan. 27 at Christ the Savior Cathedral in Moscow. It was the first leadership election since the end of Communist rule in Russia in 1990.
 
The son of a priest, Metropolitan Kirill leads the church’s external relations department. As a young man he refused to join the Communist Party, and is seen as a modernizer who enjoys cordial relations with the Roman Catholic Church.
 
Metropolitan Kirill received 508 of the 700 votes cast by senior clergy, monks and laymen who were delegates to the church’s Senior Council. He defeated a more conservative rival, Metropolitan Kliment of Kaluga and Borovsk, who received 169 votes. The third candidate nominated by bishops, Metropolitan Filaret of Minsk and Slutsk, withdrew before the vote and urged his supporters to back Metropolitan Kirill.
 
Metropolitan Kirill will be enthroned Feb. 1 as the successor to Moscow Patriarch Alexy II, who died in December at age 79.
 
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