The Vatican has confirmed that the rumoured visit by the Holy See to Russia has begun today, August 24. Secretary for Relations with States Archbishop Paul Richard Gallagher will remain in Russia until August 28, the archbishop’s first visit to Russia since the country’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.

On Tuesday, August 25, Archbishop Gallagher will meet with Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov. The two spoke by telephone in April 2025 to review “the situation of the war in Ukraine and some initiatives aimed at stopping the military actions” and it is expected that this visit will follow similar lines of discussion.

That day, the archbishop is also scheduled to meet with Metropolitan Anthony Sevryuk of Volokolamsk, chairman of the Department for External Church Relations of the Moscow Patriarchate. The metropolitan was previously the Russian Orthodox bishop of Vienna and Austria from 2017 to 2019 before being appointed Patriarchal Exarch of Western Europe until 2022.

On Wednesday, August 26, Archbishop Gallagher will meet with Yuri Ushakov, Aide to the President of the Russian Federation for Foreign Policy.

The following day, he will meet with the Catholic community in Moscow, including clergy and Religious men and women. He will celebrate Mass at the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception of the Blessed Virgin Mary in Moscow, the largest Catholic church in Russia. Afterwards, he will meet with the Catholic bishops of the country.

As of last year, there were just under 800,000 Latin-rite Catholics in Russia across 396 parishes. The Archdiocese of the Mother of God in Moscow oversees its three suffragan dioceses of St Clement at Saratov, St Joseph at Irkutsk and the Transfiguration at Novosibirsk, served by six bishops, 304 priests and 338 nuns.

Archbishop Gallagher last visited Russia in November 2021, which he said at the time was an opportunity to discuss “international issues of mutual concern for the Holy See and the Russian Federation”. In an interview with America magazine last year, Archbishop Gallagher took a firm line on the Ukraine war, which has now lasted longer than the First World War.

The archbishop told the publication: “We have to be very clear about whose tanks went across whose border, and that’s very clear. Now, you can say that maybe some of Ukraine’s pre-war strategies could have been different. I am prepared to accept that, but, in the end, the decision to invade was Russia’s alone.”

Last month, he concluded his second diplomatic mission to Ukraine, the first of which took place following the invasion. There, he met with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy, visited bombed sites and laid roses at the Maidan Memorial, which commemorates the 2013 and 2014 Euromaidan demonstrations that ousted the pro-Russian President Viktor Yanukovych.

He told Vatican News that the “exhaustion caused by this violence is clearly visible. At the same time, however, one encounters a determined and resilient people, fully aware of the many sacrifices made by their fellow citizens for the sake of their country.”

Cardinal Matteo Maria Zuppi, who visited Ukraine concurrently with Archbishop Gallagher as president of the Italian Bishops’ Conference, called for a just peace and for peace to prevail. In October 2024, as Pope Francis’s special envoy he visited Moscow to explore opportunities to continue humanitarian collaboration and seek peace. As Archbishop Gallagher is set to, he also met with Lavrov, Ushakov and Metropolitan Anthony.

The Holy See Press Office had said at the time that the visit allowed for “an assessment of the progress made so far in family reunification for minors and the exchange of prisoners, the wounded, and the remains of the fallen”.