Metropolitan Hilarion Holds Press Conference on Proposed Slavonic Reform

Metropolitan Hilarion (Alfeyev) of Volokolamsk has given a press conference on the subject of the impending updating of Slavonic, the primary liturgical language of the Russian Orthodox Church, at the request of Russian journalists.

During the press conference Metropolitan Hilarion noted the efforts of the Church prior to the Bolshevik Revolution to begin a revision of the Slavonic used in the service books to make it more comprehensible and the need for this to be undertaken today. He also, however, denied that a need existed for the services to be translated into modern Russian, saying both that they would still be difficult to understand at points and that such a translation could cause a schism like that of the Old Believers in the 17th century.

More on the press conference and Metropolitan Hilarion's statements can be found here.