Francis became the first pope to meet a patriarch of the Russian Orthodox Church since the schism that split Christianity in 1054 when he met Kirill at a Cuban airport in 2016. Another meeting would go a long way to mending the fractured ties — and promoting unity and cooperation — between Christianity’s Eastern and Western branches.
Responding to a question from a Russian reporter, Francis said he would meet next week with the Russian church’s foreign envoy “to agree on a possible meeting” with Patriarch Kirill, who leads the Russian Orthodox Church, which has been split with Rome for centuries.