The spiritual leader of the Georgian Orthodox Church for just shy of half a century, Ilia II oversaw its transformation from an institution repressed under the Soviet Union into the most powerful non-state body in one of the world's oldest Christian countries, Reuters reports.
Ilia II, the Catholicos-Patriarch of Georgia, died on Tuesday (March 17) after being hospitalised, said senior cleric Metropolitan Shio. He had been admitted for massive internal bleeding the previous evening. He was 93.
The Holy Synod, composed of senior bishops, has 40 days to elect a new leader.
Ilia II was born Irakli Ghudushauri-Shiolashvili on January 4, 1933 in Russia's North Caucasus region into a family who hailed from Georgia's mountainous Kazbegi district, just over the Greater Caucasus mountain chain separating Russia from Georgia.
He studied at Moscow's Theological Academy, which was temporarily shuttered by a Soviet ban on the teaching of religious doctrines but later reopened in the waning days of World War Two. He was ordained under the name Ilia.
Upon completion of his theological studies, Ilia II returned to Georgia and climbed the ranks of the church. He was elected the new Catholicos-Patriarch of Georgia in 1977.
Georgia adopted Christianity as its state religion in the early fourth century, and to this day the population is deeply religious and spiritual. According to a 2017 study by the Pew Research Center, 89% of Georgians identify as Orthodox Christians.
Ilia II inherited a Church that had been battered by the anti-religious campaigns undertaken by the Soviet government, including deadly purges of clergy and desecrations of holy sites. It had few clergy to serve a flock of several million.
A 2002 agreement with Georgia's first post-Soviet president, Eduard Shevardnadze, cemented the Church's unique status in Georgian social and political life. The Church was granted special rights in education and cultural heritage preservation, as well as tax exemptions.
As the Soviet Union disintegrated in 1991, the Church filled the emerging ideological vacuum once occupied by state communism, as Georgians turned to the Church as the repository of the country's traditions in their quest for a new national identity.
The Church is consistently ranked as the most respected institution in Georgia - Ilia II was named its most trusted man in a 2008 poll - although rates of weekly church attendance hover at the low levels seen in many European countries.
Throughout Ilia II's long reign, the Church found itself at the nexus of Georgia's central struggle: how a country with long-held conservative, traditional values could balance its aspirations for European integration.
For some clergy, the Western-style liberalism that Georgia sought to espouse in the first quarter of this century was at odds with its spiritual mission, and damaging to its heritage.
On social issues, for example, Ilia II was staunchly conservative. He opposed abortion and described homosexuality as a "disease", likening LGBT people to drug addicts.
He called for the government to ban a gay rights rally in 2013. When the march went ahead, several thousand counter-protesters led by Orthodox priests attacked the participants, resulting in 17 injuries, according to rights group Amnesty International.
Critics of Ilia II say that under his leadership the Church came under the sway of the Russian Orthodox Church, which President Vladimir Putin rallied to drum up support for the war in Ukraine. Moscow's influence remains a politically sensitive subject in Georgia, which fought and lost a short war against Russia in 2008.
When Russia's full-scale invasion of Ukraine began in 2022, Ilia II expressed "deep heartache" over the conflict and later called for a ceasefire, as did many other global spiritual leaders, including Pope Francis.
But in the final years of his life, Ilia II unexpectedly inserted himself into a politicised Church controversy involving Russia and Ukraine.
In 2023, as Ukraine began preparing a ban on a Russian-aligned wing of the Orthodox Church on the grounds it was collaborating with Moscow, Ilia II weighed in, urging the spiritual head of Eastern Orthodox Christians to "reduce tensions" and advocating for "mutual rapprochement".
Ilia II's posture came as Georgia's ruling Georgian Dream party was deepening economic ties with Moscow and sharply U-turning from its Western path.
In his Easter epistle in 2023, one year after the Ukraine war began, Ilia II spoke of peace and war.
"We live in difficult times, explosive times, when the threat of a nuclear catastrophe is real," he said. "Therefore, we reflect especially on peace, which is a priceless gift of God."
