Moscow's National Prayer Breakfast Gets New Format

William Yoder : Mar 24, 2011
Assist News

Unity was the order of the day.

(Moscow, Russia)—On Tuesday, March 15, 2011, approximately 200 religious and secular leaders gathered in Moscow's exclusive "President-Hotel" for the 11th Russian National Prayer Breakfast since its inception in 1995.
This year's gathering, which was entitled "Russia—a Multi-National and Multi-Cultural Country", was marked by Nikolay Svanidze's impassioned call for Russian society to address the crying social and economic needs of its young. Svanidze, a prominent TV journalist and head of the state-run "Commission of the Public Chambre for Multi-National Relations and Freedom of Conscience", decried the aggressive, xenophobic nationalism increasingly prominent among the nation's young.

Unity was the order of the day. Sergey Melnikov, Head Secretary of the "Council for Cooperation with Religious Organizations at the Seat of the President of the Russian Federation", cited the terrorist attack at Moscow's Domodedovo Airport on 24 January which killed 37 and injured 180. He remarked that thanks to blood donations, "the blood in the veins of the survivors was merged with the blood of those from differing faiths". (Photo: Christian Telegraph)

This symbolizes Russia's existence as a united and single organism. Akhmad Garifullin, a deputy of Moscow's head mufti, noted that the USSR's victory over fascism was only possible because the nation acted as one organism irrespective of individual confession. Today's challenges demand a similar amount of unity: "Prayer is the weapon of the Believers. We stand together in the struggle against terror."

Criticism of the Breakfast's new format centers on the fear that the event may not remain explicitly Christian. Yet Russia's National Prayer Breakfast movement is far from dead. A similar Breakfast was held in St. Petersburg on March 20th; another will take place in Krasnoyarsk/Siberia in April. Next year's Moscow event is scheduled for March 13, 2012.

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