Moscow Inter-Council Presence’ Commission meets

(mospat.ru) - On 24 February 2010, the first session of the Inter-Council Presence’ Commission on Theology took place at the Moscow Patriarchate Department for external church relations. Metropolitan Philaret of Minsk and Slutsk, Patriarchal Exarch of All Belarus and chairman of the Synodal Biblical-Theological Commission chaired the session.

The Commission consists of 18 persons, including Metropolitan Hilarion, chairman of the Moscow Patriarchate Department for external church relations, other archpastors of the Russian Orthodox Church, professors and teachers of the theological schools, clergymen and laymen.

In his introductory address Metropolitan Philaret spoke about compiling the contemporary Catechism of the Russian Orthodox Church and the efforts undertaken for the development of Biblical science. He informed the members that the presidium of the Inter-Council Presence charged the Commission on Theology to consider the following themes:

• theological comprehension of the creation of the world and man;
• correlation of science and faith;
• attitude of the Church to the various translations of the Holy Scriptures;
• publication of materials that facilitate understanding of the texts from the Holy Scriptures used in divine services.

The participants adopted the order of the Commission’s work and decided to hold seminars with theologians and experts to thoroughly consider the theme on the agenda at the Moscow and St. Petersburg Theological academies, St. Tikhon’s Orthodox Humanitarian University, and the Institute of Philosophy of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Thanks to modern communication technology, the materials will be available to all members of the commission, thus enabling their direct participation in compiling a final document.