Patriarch Kirill congratulated Russian President Dmitry Medvedev when they met at a Christmas Eve service in Moscow's ChristTheSaviourCathedral on Friday night.
From St Basil's Cathedral, the Kremlin, ChristtheSaviourCathedral and Manej Square, Chance gives us the latest on what makes the Russia of today, from domestic and foreign policy, to business, to culture.
Most strikingly, he has masterminded a series of grand projects, especially the vast Cathedral of ChristtheSaviour, a monument to tsarist splendour whose predecessor was blown up by Stalin in 1931.