The Vatican welcomed Monday the election of a new head of the Georgian Orthodox Church, one of the 14 universally recognized self-governing Eastern Orthodox Churches.
Cardinal Kurt Koch, prefect of the Dicastery for Promoting Christian Unity, said in a May 11 message that he learned with great joy of Shio III’s election as the Catholicos-Patriarch of All Georgia.
The Swiss cardinal wrote: “I am certain that your service will reinforce the bonds of charity and unity which, by the gift of the Holy Spirit, we already truly share, even if not yet fully, with all those who believe in Jesus Christ, so that the Lord’s commandment may become ever more visible: ‘that you love one another as I have loved you’ (John 13:34).”
What is the Georgian Orthodox Church? Who is Shio III, and what does his election mean for Catholic-Orthodox ties?
What is the Georgian Orthodox Church?
Georgia is a nation of around 3.8 million people bordering Russia, Azerbaijan, Armenia, and Turkey. It regained independence in 1991, following the collapse of the Soviet Union. But its history as a unified entity dates back to 1008 AD.
The Georgian Orthodox Church traces its origins back even further, to apostolic times. According to its tradition, its earliest communities were established directly by St. Andrew the Apostle.
It was recognized as an independent, self-governing church in the 5th century.
In the 11th to 13th centuries, a period known as the Georgian Golden Age, the Georgian Church occupied an influential position within the Orthodox world, offering political and financial support to Orthodox communities across the Balkans and Holy Land.
The Georgian Orthodox Church suffered persecution under Soviet rule, driven by Joseph Stalin, who, in a grim irony, had studied for the Orthodox priesthood in Georgia’s capital, Tbilisi, before becoming a communist revolutionary.
The era forged outstanding figures, including St. Gabriel Urgebadze, who set fire to a giant portrait of Lenin at a May Day event in 1965 while denouncing the crowd’s idolatry.
In 1990, the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople formally recognized the long-established self-governing status of the Georgian Orthodox Church and the title of Catholicos for its leader.
From 1977 to March 2026, the Church was led by Ilia II of Georgia, a beloved national figure. Concerned by the country’s low post-Soviet birth rate, he offered to serve as godparent to the third child onward of Georgian families.
At his death, he had around 50,000 godchildren and was credited in some quarters with singlehandedly reviving the birth rate.
When Ilia II died March 17, at the age of 93, he was the longest-serving patriarch in the Georgian Orthodox Church’s history. He had ensured that the Church returned to its historic place as Georgia’s paramount religious institution.
His death appeared to mark the end of an era of revival, and signal the start of a new and uncertain epoch for Georgian Orthodox Christians.
Who is Shio III?
Ilia II was frail in his final decade. In 2017, he took the precaution of appointing a locum tenens to steer the Georgian Orthodox Church following his death and until the election of a new patriarch. The man he chose was the then-Metropolitan Shio, the Bishop of Senaki and Chkhorotsku.
Shio was born Elizbar Mujiri in Tbilisi in 1969. He studied the cello at the Tbilisi State Conservatoire, graduating in 1991, before pursuing his theological studies in Georgia and Russia. He was tonsured as a monk in 1993, taking the name Shio, associated with a 6th-century saint who helped to establish Georgian monasticism.
Shio oversaw churches in Tbilisi and Moscow before his appointment as bishop in 2003.
In addition to governing the Senaki and Chkhorotskuri eparchy in Georgia, he was responsible, from 2009, for Georgian Orthodox Christians in Australia and New Zealand.
His profile rose greatly with his nomination as patriarchal locum tenens, which many observers interpreted as a sign he was Ilia II’s preferred successor. He was elected May 11 by the Holy Synod, receiving 22 out of 39 possible votes.
What does his election mean?
Commentators are currently delving into Shio III’s biography in an effort to discern his position on contested Church issues. There’s a consensus that his views are close to Ilia II’s, if not identical.
Both men, for example, have not endorsed the Ecumenical Patriarchate of Constantinople’s decision to grant recognition to the Orthodox Church of Ukraine in 2018.
This stance underlines that the Georgian Orthodox Church has a closer affinity with the Russian Orthodox Church than the Ecumenical Patriarchate.
But there are many nuances. Ilia II reportedly criticized Patriarch Kirill of Moscow’s support for Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine.
While Shio III has biographical ties to Russia, he is now head of a fully independent Eastern Orthodox Church, not a satellite of the Moscow Patriarchate.
On relations with Rome, Ilia II’s position could be described as respectful but distant. He became the first Georgian patriarch to visit the Vatican in 1980.
He welcomed Pope John Paul II to Georgia in 1999 and Pope Francis in 2016, where they also met with the country’s small Catholic community, which numbers around 112,000, according to the Vatican.
But Ilia II had reservations about the ecumenical movement that restricted his engagement.
The Georgian Orthodox Church continued to be involved in Catholic-Orthodox dialogue, but it was more hesitant than other self-governing Eastern Orthodox Churches.
For instance, Georgian Orthodox theologians expressed concerns about the language of a 2016 Catholic-Orthodox document on primacy, but did not block its publication.
Shio III is said to share Ilia’s doubts about ecumenism and possibly be even more cautious.
This may explain why the Vatican was quick to send its congratulatory message and may be eager that its representatives meet with the new patriarch at the first opportunity.