page_title: Christianity in Russia
section_title: Catholic Church
hierarchical_section_title: Christianity in Russia / Catholic Church
caption_attribution_description: This is a photo of a cultural heritage object in Russia, number: 7810334000 This template and pages using it are maintained by the Russian WLM team. Please read the guidelines before making any changes that can affect the monuments database!
context_page_description: Christianity in Russia is the most widely professed religion in the country, with nearly 71% of the population identifying as Orthodox Christian according to World Atlas. The largest tradition is the Russian Orthodox Church. According to official sources, there are 68 eparchies of the Russian Orthodox Church. There are from 500,000 to one million Old Believers, who represents an older form of Russian Orthodox Christianity, and who separated from the Orthodox Church in the 17th century as a protest against Patriarch Nikon's church reforms.
  The Catholic Church estimates that there are from 600,000 to 1.5 million Catholics in the country, exceeding government estimates of about 140,000. There is one Catholic Archdiocese, Mother of God at Moscow, with three suffragan dioceses and the Apostolic Prefecture of Yuzhno Sakhalinsk. According to the Slavic Center for Law and Justice, Protestants make up the second or third largest group of Christians in Russia, with approximately 3,500 organizations and more than 1 million followers. A large number of missionaries operating in the country are from Protestant denominations.
context_section_description: As of 2008, the Catholic Church in Russia had one Archdiocese of Mother of God at Moscow (headed by Archbishop Pavel Pezzi), three dioceses (Saint Clement at Saratov, Saint Joseph at Irkutsk, Transfiguration at Novosibirsk), one Apostolic Exarchate and one Apostolic Prefecture in Yuzhno Sakhalinsk. The Catholic Archbishop of Moscow has voiced his support for religious education in state sponsored schools, citing the examples of other countries.
  Relations with the Russian Orthodox church have been difficult for nearly a millennium, and attempts at re-establishing Catholicism have met with opposition. Pope John Paul II expressed a desire to visit Russia, but the Russian Orthodox Church resisted. In April 2002, Bishop Jerry Mazur of Eastern Siberia was stripped of his visa, forcing the appointment of a new bishop for that diocese. In 2002, five foreign Catholic priests were denied visas to return to Russia, construction of a new cathedral was blocked in Pskov, and a church in southern Russia was shot at. On December 25, 2005, Russian Orthodox activists planned to picket outside of Moscow's Catholic Cathedral, but the picket was cancelled. Despite easing of relations with the election of Pope Benedict XVI, there remain issues such as the readiness of the police to protect Catholics and other minorities from persecution.
  One thousand Russian Catholics gathered in the Virgin Mary's Immaculate Conception Cathedral in Moscow to watch the funeral of Pope John Paul II in 2005. He had previously given an 18th-century copy of the famous Our Lady of Kazan icon to the Russian Orthodox Church.
caption: Catholic Church in St.Petersburg
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