Patriarch Neofit, a gentle theologian who tried to restore the reputation of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church tarnished by ties to businessmen and the communist secret police, has died at the age of 78, the church said late on Wednesday, Reuters reported.

“After a long illness, at 10:22 p.m. at the Military Medical Academy (VMA-Sofia), His Holiness Patriarch of Bulgaria and Metropolitan Neophyte of Sofia, archbishop of our native Holy Orthodox Church, died of multiple organ failure,” the church said in a statement.

The neophyte was enthroned in 2013 and succeeded Patriarch Maxim, who led the church from 1971 until his death in 2012.

About 80% of Bulgaria’s 6.8 million people are Orthodox Christians, but the reputation of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church was damaged after a historical commission found in January 2012 that 11 of its 15 bishops had collaborated with the former communist-era secret police.