Head of the Synodal Department for External Church Relations
Metropolitan Hilarion of Volokolamsk assures the Russian Orthodox Church
will help restore destroyed churches in Syria.
"Certainly, we will take part in restoring churches, but first of all,
we should restore peace in the country. It is difficult to get down to
restoration, when the power in the territory is changing hands every now
and then," he said at his meeting with Moscow State Linguistic
University students on Tuesday in Moscow.
According to the hierarch, the key task is "to restore civil peace in
the region, wipe away the terrorists and then start thinking about the
program of restoring not only churches, but the whole infrastructure."
The metropolitan pointed out that the Church had carried out various
humanitarian programs in Syria, it regularly helped organize
humanitarian convoy to the country.