MOSCOW — The Russian Orthodox Church continued what appeared to be an effort to get the authorities to address Russians’ grievances over the political system, with Patriarch Kirill I, the church’s leader, saying in a televised interview that it would be “a very bad sign” if the country’s leaders failed to heed recent protests over perceived electoral fraud.

The church, a powerful force in Russia, made a point of announcing that the patriarch would be speaking on Saturday, which is Christmas Day in Russia.

The announcement, made on Thursday, came just 15 minutes after the Interfax news agency released a report on an essay by a senior church official, Archpriest Vsevolod Chaplin, that made the same point as the patriarch, but in starker terms: it said that the authorities could be “slowly eaten alive” if they did not respond to Russians’ concerns.

Church leaders have been walking a careful line since the parliamentary elections on Dec. 4, nudging the government to respond to the protesters and affirming their right to demonstrate, but Patriarch Kirill I has not questioned the legitimacy of the elections or criticized Prime Minister Vladimir V. Putin.