Patriarch Kirill considers protecting the family more important than supporting industry

Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Rus’ said that without decisive measures to support the family, Russia “will cease to be a great power.” Protecting family values, he said, is much more important than investing in industry.

“Some may think that it is better to direct large cash flows to the development of, for example, industry: they say, such investments will return and multiply faster. But if you don’t literally invest in saving and increasing the people, then there will be no one to take advantage of this achievement,” the patriarch said at the annual diocesan meeting of Moscow (quote from “Interfax”).

He added that the well-being of the family and the “multiplying of the people” are the main principles for preserving the country. Without decisive measures, as the patriarch said, in the next generations Russia will cease to be a great power, which means “the prospect of losing territories and the possible disappearance of a single country.”

Family protection should be carried out through economic decisions that increase the level of well-being and “support the desire to give birth and raise” children, Patriarch Kirill said. The Church, he said, welcomes any initiative that reduces the number of abortions, while he called the current measures insufficient.

On November 22, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed a decree according to which 2024 is awarded the status of the Year of the Family. The document states that this decision should contribute to “the popularization of state policy in the field of family protection and the preservation of traditional family values.”

More details in the text “Kommersant” “Russians are turned into family”.

Petr Buzlaev