Biography of His Holiness Patriarch Kirill of Moscow and All Russia
Moscow Patriarchate, Department for External Church Relations
The Moscow Patriarchate’s official life of Patriarch Kirill: his birth in Leningrad in 1946, his years as head of the church’s external relations, and his election as patriarch in January 2009.
The page gives the secular name of Kirill of Moscow, Vladimir Mikhailovich Gundyaev, his birth in Leningrad on 20 November 1946 as the son and grandson of priests, his chairmanship of the Department for External Church Relations from 1989 to 2009, his election as patriarch by a local council of the Russian Orthodox Church on 27 January 2009 and his enthronement on 1 February 2009. It is his own church’s record and is used in this wiki for dates and offices.