Posted on 05/12/2013 2:20:08 PM PDT by marshmallow
On 10 May the leader of the Russian Orthodox Church was received by President Xi Jinping, leading to the creation of a new Moscow-Beijing axis
The overture to Patriarch Kirill’s official visit to China marked an important moment in relations between China and the Orthodox Church. Yesterday, in the Great Hall of the People, the leader of the Russian Orthodox Church had the privilege of meeting Chinese President, Xi Jinping. “You are the first Patriarch of Moscow and the first supreme religious leader from Russia to visit our country,” Xi told Kirill, presenting this unprecedented event as a “clear sign of the strength and high level of relations between China and Russia.” Russian news agency RIA Novosti reported that during their conversation, Kirill emphasised the “special relationship that has blossomed between Russia and China in recent years.”
The large, 80-member-strong patriarchal delegation will be in Beijing until tomorrow, 12 May, when Kirill will celebrate the Divine Liturgy in the Orthodox Church inside the Russian Embassy. Kirill and his entourage will then move onto Harbin, in North-Eastern China, which is home to the country’s largest community of Russian immigrants. The delegation will conclude its visit on 15 May, in Shanghai.
The official and ritualistic gestures and words that were exchanged give an idea of the importance of this meeting and the implications for relations between China and other Christian Churches, not just the Russian Orthodox one.
(Excerpt) Read more at vaticaninsider.lastampa.it ...
China and Russia. O kay...isn’t this part of biblical prophecy?
Still interesting as all get out.
The thing to watch for is a tipping point where Chinese are mostly Christian.
The book takes as its starting point the observation that the Chinese conception of the Tao is completely analogous to the Neoplatonic conception of the Logos, which St. John the Theologian "baptized" and applied to understanding who Christ is in the opening of his Gospel. Indeed, the classical Taoist conception of the selflessness of the Tao, may make the philosophical notion a closer fit than the one St. John had access to.
There is more resonance between Confucianism and Western Christianity, and more resonance between Taoism and Eastern Christianity. Of course, either way, the Lord’s vineyard in China shows potential for a great harvest.
I wonder if anything is left in Shanghai from the days of St. John
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