World Crises | Reuters.com: Russian church blames liberalism for racist murders

A top Orthodox cleric said on Tuesday tolerance of homosexuality, euthanasia and abortion was responsible for a moral collapse that had spawned extreme nationalism and racism in Russia. The Orthodox Church, enshrined by law as first among equals in Russian religious life, has close ties to top officials and sees itself as guardian of conservative Russian values at a time of flux following the collapse of the Soviet Union. "We cannot accept the mocking of the sacred, abortion, homosexuality, euthanasia, exploitation of national feelings and other such kinds of behaviour that are often defended as a human right," Metropolitan Kirill said in an emotional speech to politicians and religious leaders aired on primetime television. "You can't complain about a rise in xenophobia at a time when we allow a person to destroy the sacred, spit on his fatherland, destroy his own culture without being stopped by right-thinking people. This person will go and kill someone else, on the basis of race, or of faith," he said. In a sign of the everyday nature of racist violence in Russia the news report showing Kirill was bracketed by reports on the start of the trial of young men accused of murdering a Peruvian student, and of the search for the attackers of a renowned artist from Russia's Caucasus.