“This is a very sad event, I knew Father Vsevolod for a very long time, for many, many years. He was a bright, contradictory person, not afraid to defend his point of view. It’s clear that many did not like it, many liked it, but the person was very outstanding, and I don’t even want to talk about him in the past tense, ”Bystritsky said.
He also called Chaplin a man "gifted, educated to an outstanding degree."
“In general, it was a strong and expressive personality. One can only regret that we lost it, because there should be different voices and different points of view, and Father Vsevolod was a very expressive conversationalist of our time, ”the source said.
Bystritsky added that he and Chaplin always maintained contact, but, “unfortunately, not always as often as we would like.”
“We met, talked, argued a lot, discussed various problems,” he concluded.
Archpriest Vsevolod Chaplin died at the 52nd year of his life on Sunday, January 26, near the church of Theodore Studite at the Nikitsky Gate in Moscow.
He served as chairman of the synodal department for relations between the church and society of the Moscow Patriarchate of the Russian Orthodox Church in 2009—2015. In 1999, Chaplin was elevated to the rank of archpriest.