The visit of His Holiness Patriarch Kyrill of Moscow and All the Russias will be taking place this weekend and the week after, when he will have an audience with Her Majesty Queen Elizabeth II. During the visit he will visit both Russian churches in London and will celebrate on Sunday at the Russian church in Ennismore Gardens, commemorating the 300th anniversary of the presence of the Russian Orthodox Church in these islands.

His visit comes at a time of immense international tension after the defeat by Russia of US-backed (‘moderate’) terrorists in Syria and the catastrophes for Western-backed forces in Libya and the Yemen as well as huge difficulties for the bankrupt Western puppet regimes in the Ukraine and France. The internet has been awash with the usual hysterical rumours of a looming ‘Third World War’ and imminent nuclear warfare between the USA and, simultaneously, the Russian Federation and China. Sadly, these rumours have been promoted by neocon generals and politicians in Washington, who are greatly disturbed that the Democratic/neocon candidate for the Presidential elections in the USA may be defeated, with the result that their budgets will be slashed.

It can only be hoped that the Patriarchal visit, though much attacked by the irrational and propagandist paid sections of the British corporate media (e.g. The Times of London and the BBC), will do something to defuse these absurd and unneeded tensions.