Bartholomew I of Constantinople

And they're like, oh, no, this is totally something the Catholics are doing.

And again, I do realize that the patriarch, Patriarch Bartholomew, is not speaking for all of the patriarchs when he says this.

They have a different way of doing church governance than, say, the Magisterium in Rome.

But it's not unusual.

Let's not pretend this is the only time this has ever been done.

Even in October of 2020, Patriarch Bartholomew, who's the head of the Eastern Orthodox from Constantinople, spoke about the idea of the death penalty himself.

He said, the logical and moral consequence of adherence to Christian principles of human dignity.

So he's kind of echoing.

In addition to the Pope, Cardinal Zuppi will also be present, not only in his capacity as president of the Italian Bishops' Conference.

The gathering will feature the Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew I of Constantinople, Indonesia's Minister of Religious Affairs and Imam of Jakarta's Mosque, and Hala al-Karib, a Sudanese activist.

The Chief Rabbi of France will also be present.

On September 28th, during the Pope's apostolic journey through France together with other representatives of religions, the rabbi signed the Metz Appeal in the presence of Pope Leo, a document that echoes the spirit of Assisi and once again proposes all religions as necessary instruments for disarming the world.

They're going to give conferences.

And then the Pope is going to pray leading prayers with, of course, the heretical and schismatic Bishop Bartholomew, Patriarch Bartholomew of the Schismatic Church, who I guess Fernandez won't excommunicate.

Because I guess he was consecrated without people mandate, I think.

But in any event, then they're going to have another hootenanny prayer service with all the other hundreds of religions and with all the atheists, secularists and globalists joining hands and all praying for peace.

The Pope will travel to Assisi October 27th for the final day of the 2026 Interreligious Gathering, which runs October 25th to 27th, and marks the 40th annual meeting inspired by that historic 1986 event.

Pope Leo will join the Christian community in Assisi's Lower Basilica for a special prayer service, where he and Patriarch Bartholomew will offer reflections.

The meeting's theme, Disarmed and Disarming Peace, comes from the Pope's own calls for peace and disarmament.

Organizers say 384 representatives from 53 countries will take part, including 155 speakers across 24 forums on topics ranging from conflict and migration to youth, media, Christian unity, and contemporary martyrs.

Organizers say 384 representatives of religions, cultures, and institutions from 53 countries will participate in this year's gathering.

Pope Leo will join the event October 27th and offer a meditation alongside ecumenical patriarch Bartholomew during a special prayer for peace.

And that's Newsmakers for this Wednesday, October 7th, 2026 edition.

I'm Keith Black.

Islam holds the concept-- upholds the concept of humans as khalifa, trustees or stewards of the Earth and its inhabitants.

Patriarch Bartholomew I, the Patriarch of Constantinople and the spiritual leader of Eastern Orthodox Christians, is known as the Green Patriarch, bless him, who famously teaches that committing crimes against the natural world is a direct sin.

Pope Francis, in his encyclical Laudato Si', On Care for Our Common Home, framed creation care as a moral duty.

He explicitly tied environmental degradation directly to the suffering of the poor.

But it says here, a leaked internal Constantinople document describes President Petro Poroshenko and Ukraine's security service keeping the Patriarch of Constantinople's delegation under round-the-clock surveillance in the days around the December 28th Unification Council, 2018 Unification Council in Kiev, which created the schismatic Orthodox Church of Ukraine.

According to an exclusive report by the Union of Orthodox Journalists of America, the document is a chronicle of more than 20 pages addressed to Patriarch Bartholomew, authored by Metropolitan Gregorios of Ankara, who was a deacon of the Patriarchal Court at the time.

Sorry, my nose was just really itchy.

According to the document, when the delegation led by Metropolitan Emmanuel of France tried to leave Ukraine over a dispute with the self-proclaimed patriarch, Filaret Denysenko of the Kiev Patriarchate, police arrived to take members of the group to the presidential palace.

I realize this was the picture of, that I was showing of Emmanuel.

Metropolitan Emmanuel then told his companions they were forbidden to leave the country, that the delegation had earlier resorted to communicating on paper because of what Metropolitan Gregorios describes as constant surveillance of everything in the building.

The document says a tense phone call followed between Poroshenko and Patriarch Bartholomew, after which Poroshenko returned within an hour with Filaret's signature on a document dropping his demands for special powers in the OCU, which would be an amalgamation of his Kiev Patriarchate and the schismatic Ukrainian Autocephalous Orthodox Church.

Metropolitan Gregorios also writes that more than 10 secret agents moved around us as the delegation ate at a restaurant.

That's why we're so grateful to our friends at the UOJ and OrthoChristian for doing such a good job covering what's going on in Ukraine and around the world with this, you know, satanic regime and what it's doing.

And thankfully, it appears that a consensus in the Orthodox Church is emerging, Patriarch Bartholomew, and of course, We say it doesn't appear that, you know, it hasn't happened yet.

Of course, it'll happen within 24 hours of this episode being recorded.

So stay tuned to the World War Now social medias.

So obviously got to say a prayer for the monastery at St. Catherine's, very historic place.

They've got, you know, the burning bush, the Pantokrator icon.

And as far as my, the final story I have here is many Bulgarians are protesting Patriarch Bartholomew's intended visit in October to Sofia, the sacred Rila monastery.

So they are obviously against everything going on in Ukraine.

And even the patriarchs themselves are in these conversations.

Patriarch Bartholomew has been very close with the last few popes.

There's constant communication about this, but it seems like the followers always bring up things like this situation as a reason why we shouldn't or why we need to work through it.

This seems to be a big, big, big deal when it comes to the conversation of reunification.