PATRIARCH: CHURCH CAN HELP STATE IN BATTLE WITH CORRUPTION
The church can help the state to combat corruption more effectively, since it trains people in the spirit of evangelical values and the highest moral requirements, Patriarch of Moscow and all-Rus Kirill declared during the signing of an agreement on cooperation between the RPTs [Russian Orthodox Church] and the Accounts Chamber.
The signing of the agreement occurred in the Throne Room of the patriarchal and synodal residence in the St. Daniel's monastery. The patriarch and the chairperson of the Accounts Chamber of the Russian Federation, Tatiana Golikova, put their signatures on the document. The agreement was concluded in order to improve the moral climate in Russia and to preserve the national, spiritual, historical, and cultural heritage, which is a necessary condition for the successful development of the state and improvement of the life of citizens.R
"The work of the Accounts Chamber has a substantial impact on the moral climate in society. We know that corruption, or speaking more simply, stealing degrades the human individual. And if corruption reaches substantial scales, it erodes the healthy tissue of human society and undermines the foundations of the state," the patriarch said.
He said that citizens of the RF went through difficult times in the 1990s and early 2000s: "The collapse of the economy, the collapse of public psychology, the destruction of certain ideals and the attempt to create new ideals." In the opinion of the primate of the RPTs, all of this had an impact on "the state of mind of many of our citizens and led to the development of various vices, including those connected with theft of public and state property."
The patriarch emphasized especially that he thinks cooperation between the Accounts Chamber and the RPTs is "very timely and proper." He noted that the Accounts Chamber today is "the most effective" and perhaps "the only strong body capable of controlling the use of government resources" and the church works with human souls "because just some levers of power are clearly insufficient in overcoming corruption."
In her turn, Tatiana Golikova expressed the hope that the signed agreement "will facilitate combating corruption, extremism, and religious expansion, and at the same time the revival of cultural and historical values of the Russian federation." "It seems to me that this is the correct route of cooperation between the church and state," the chairperson of the Accounts Chamber concluded. (tr. by PDS, posted 24 July 2015)
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