By Metropolitan Chrysostomos III of Mani
The “Archon of the Holy Mountain,” the great scholar and spiritual man, Father Vasileios Gontikakis, former abbot of the Sacred Monastery of Stavronikita and former abbot of the Sacred Monastery of Iviron, has passed away. We are obliged to write a few lines in memory of the renowned elder Father Vasileios, because I personally had the blessing of knowing him since my student years.
Father Vaseilios was a rare personality. A hieromonk of genuine deep faith, complete devotion to monastic ideals, with a holy life, with a rich education, both secular and Christian. It is undeniable that he contributed greatly to the flourishing of monastic life in the Athonite State, especially for the reestablishment of coenobitic life. The elder himself, Father Vaseilios, constitutes a serious chapter in the history of monastic life on Mount Athos.
At the beginning of the 1960s, when he had already become a monk and was with Saint Paisios, one day the professor, his father in the flesh, Konstantinos from Heraklion, Crete, came to visit him and when he saw him outside the Skete chopping wood, he said to him: “My son, this is why I had you educated, to come here, to chop wood”? Then, the monk Father Vaseilios replied: “Yes, father, I chop wood, because I have not yet learned humility!"
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We must emphasize that Father Vaseilios’s speech was biblical and patristic. A combination of Greek classical antiquity and God-bearing patristic wisdom. While it was a speech as if from some other higher world, a heavenly world, at the same time it was a human speech, of everyday life, of the needs of man. It took you and raised you to the heavenly tabernacles with the angels, the Most Holy Theotokos, the saints and at the same time it troubled you about the vanity of earthly things and situations. Sometimes it spoke slowly and sometimes very quickly. Thoughtfully but also “passionately” about dedication to God, desertion, asceticism, death, the Resurrection.
You could not easily grasp his thoughts, his expressions, his words. Where he spoke to you about some great father and ascetic of the Church, there he offered you as a model of holiness a poor old woman from some small island. Where he praised a Hierarch, there he praised the stole of the indistinguished priest of the village. He had in his speech but also in his pen an authentic personal style of his own. He had his own language to convey the lofty meanings of Orthodox spirituality. Thus he managed to unite yesterday with today, to elevate you to timeless times, to move young people, to reason with the elderly, to advise, to encourage and to support shaken souls, but he knew above all to be silent and to pray. He was the “man of the Holy Spirit,” a Spirit-bearer, where in his soul he had collected “every virtue.”
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I remember him, specifically, in 1976, at the Amphitheater of the Athens Law School (and in later years he spoke again at the Law School), when I had invited him to speak to the students, how authentic he was in his speech, which immediately won over the difficult audience. “I don’t believe in God. I am an anarchist,” a student shouted at him. And Father Vaseilios replied: “We are colleagues. And I also am an anarchist, who is searching to find God.” And the lively dialogue continued until the rebellious student told him: “You are something else… I accept you.”
I remember him in the 1970s, at beautiful spiritual gatherings in Athens, in Pangrati, in Chalandri and in Agia Paraskevi, where people of various sciences went to listen to him, to have a dialogue with him, but also to adopt his admonitions and his aphoristic words drawn from his pure heart, his kindness, his goodness, his nobility.
I remember him at a theological conference at St. Serge in Paris, where he left the best impressions as a “Byzantine man” as they called him, when he spoke about the concept of the deification of man (La déification de l’homme).
I remember him as a speaker at theological conferences, a speaker in large halls of institutions, where people ran, especially young people, to hear “Gontikakis,” as they very characteristically said. Very characteristic remains his strong, serious and responsible presence at the 6th Panhellenic Congress of Theologians, in September 1986 under the Archepiscopacy of Seraphim and the Presidency of the Theological Seminary of Professor Mouratidos at the CARAVEL hotel (Athens), where he spoke on the topic: “The Archetype of Orthodoxy in Practice: the Saint”.
We recall that this presentation of his was all Father Vaseilios. He expressed the “end” that he had in his entire devoted life and that was holiness. You could see there, the ethos of the elder. You discerned, not a false humility, not a hypocritical attitude, not a shallowness of speech, not a wooden tongue, not formalities of the moment, but you had the certain feeling that you saw in the face, in the speech, in the expression, the genuine monk, the authentic liturgist of the Most High, the one who is also a link in the golden chain of the saints of God. Characteristic are what N. Galetas, engineer, writes in his letter to the President of the Conference of the NTUA: "In fact, the last presentation of Father Vaseilios Gontikakis, with which he closed the conference, I think was a spiritual feast, a mystagogue for all of us. That evening we all left the conference hall with warmer hearts, comforted and with the certainty that despite the difficulties, there is the hope given by Him who is 'the ONE who WAS and the ONE WHO IS and the ONE WHO IS TO COME,' the only and final answer of God for the past, present and future of human tragedy."
Father Vaseilios was never interested in applause, praise, gifts, or encomiums, because the biblical saying “I am a worthless servant; I have done what was my duty” (Luke 17:10) and that the present time was “of toil and sweat” dominated him. The only thing that set his heart on fire was “how it pleases the Lord.” This was Father Vaseilios. This is how they lived in the “Garden of the Panagia.”
I also remember that when I was preparing for my ordination as a deacon and was at the Sacred Monastery of Iviron and I asked him for some advice, after a long time of silence he said to me: “Well, then, I say to you: Immerse yourself in the Divine Liturgy!"
The elder always calmly, wisely and discreetly provided the appropriate solutions to various serious problems and issues in general that came to the fore, unresolved for our society. Solutions based on the Holy Gospel, on patristic theology, on the holy tradition of our Church.
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Regarding, then, with his writings, by analogy, the saying that was said about Basil the Great, “Basil lived and died in the Lord, and lives among us, as we read in Scripture.” Indeed, he wrote many books, important, profound, theological, ascetic, books with all the fragrance of Orthodox spirituality. The best book, in our humble opinion, is “Hymn of Entry” (first edition 1974), which has undergone successive reprints. It is a book/study which penetrates the theological depth of the Divine Liturgy and spiritual life, the theosis of man. With this book you understand what the Divine Liturgy means and what happens during the celebration of the Divine Liturgy.
Another valuable book, small in size, but great in the meanings of ascetic life, is: “Abba Isaac the Syrian, An Approach to His World” (1st ed. 1981). Next, "The Holy Mountain and the Education of the Nation" (1st ed. 1984), which was published anonymously as "Text of the Holy Community of the Holy Mountain" in difficult times for the entire education and training of the country. His other writings are: “Theological Commentary on the Frescoes of Theophan of the Sacred Monastery of Stavronikita” (1987), “The Parable of the Prodigal Son” (1st ed. 1990), “Beauty and Peace in the Athonite State” (1999), “Liturgical Method” (2000), “The Light of Christ Shines on All” (2002), “Dismissal Hymn: Now Everything is Filled with Light” (2011), “Heraclitus, the Everlasting Glory of Mortals: A Theological Approach” (2025), etc.
In short, Father Vaseilios (Gontikakis) outlined a course of life according to Christ, through Christ and in Christ. He loved the Lord Jesus Christ from childhood until he gave up his soul in the early hours of September 17, 2025, to the angel who came to take it. Like another bright sun, Elder Vaseilios truly reigned in this life, to rise to the heavenly altar of the Lord of Glory.
In particular, the Sacred Monasteries of Stavronikita and Iviron, as well as the entire Holy Mountain, now have another intercessor in the triumphant Church.
May his memory be eternal.
Source: Translated by John Sanidopoulos.
