The Patriarch is perplexed

Patriarch Kirill, Interfax-religion reports, was surprised to learn that in the Penza region 100% of schoolchildren chose secular ethics. He suspects that the students' parents are being pressured, possibly by local authorities. If we take Penza, then there are 200 priests serving there. Did they, too, choose secular ethics for their children, the patriarch expresses doubts.

“Apparently, the organizers of this fraud did not think that at least some percentage should have been left in order to convince people of voluntariness. They didn’t think of it,” he said at a meeting with the governors and bishops of the Ural Federal District in Chelyabinsk.

“It is very important that voluntariness is respected and that there are no excesses reminiscent of the Soviet elections,” the patriarch said and expressed the hope that “there will be no excesses that offend our national dignity.”