26/05/2026
Online Round Table
IS THERE A FUTURE FOR ORTHODOX THEOLOGY TODAY?
Thursday, May 28, 2026, 7:30 p.m. EEST
The fourth and last event for this year in the series “Time for Action” of the Volos Academy for Theological Studies will take place on Thursday, May 28, 2026, at 7:30 p.m. Athens time (EEST), and its topic will be “Is there a future for Orthodox theology today?”. The speakers will be Paul Gavrilyuk, Aquinas Chair Professor of Theology and Philosophy, University of St. Thomas (St. Paul, Minnesota, USA) and President of IOTA; Michel Stavrou, Dean and Professor of Dogmatic Theology of Saint Sergius Institute of Orthodox Theology (Paris); and Haralambos Ventis, Professor of Philosophy of Religion, University of Athens. The discussion will be moderated by Pantelis Kalaitzidis, Director of Volos Academy. The languages will be English, French and Greek with simultaneous interpretation.
The link for attending is https://us06web.zoom.us/j/82746711766
A century ago, Georges Florovsky interpreted the ways of Orthodox theology in modernity in Spengler's terms of a western 'pseudomorphosis' (i.e. distortions due to western influences). His solution was to 'return to the Church Fathers' and his program, the neopatristic synthesis became the dominant paradigm of Orthodox theology in the second part of the twentieth century. Many contemporary Orthodox theologians continue to accept Florovsky's paradigm with revisions; for them, the ongoing re-engagement with the patristic tradition continues to be at the center of the theological enterprise. A vocal minority of Orthodox theologians propose to set Florovsky's paradigm aside and focus on the theological engagement of the contemporary culture. The neopatristic paradigm presupposes a diaochronic 'return' or retrieval; the paradigm of contextual theology presupposes an intellectual expansion of theology outward. In the -present-day discussions of the future 'ways of Orthodox theology', it is often missed that these two approaches (the neopatristic and the contextual one) do not have to be mutually exclusive. On the contrary, they could be mutually determining.
Through its richness and its cultural and spiritual diversity, theology is called upon to face the challenges of the 21st century in order to ensure the unity of the Church. It is therefore incumbent upon theologians to collectively address the persistent difficulty in organizing communion among the Churches between two equally unacceptable models: on the one hand, an imperial-style framework, and on the other, a strictly conciliar, national model. It is thus necessary to work towards developing a common ecclesiology for the governance of universal Orthodoxy, in order to rediscover a shared vision of the Church capable of putting an end to recurring disputes.
All of the above, however, are placed under the constant crisis of history, which is well-known to “hold a thick eraser in its hands” and to always finds a way to dissolve, gradually or even by summary procedures, all the world idols whose structural materials do not withstand the light of the documented, hard truth, the one that lies outside the ghetto of the ideologues and the religious. This law also applies to that institutional spiritual tradition about the future, whose Founder warned in good time, pointing out with a highly illustrative analogy, the fate reserved for salt when it fades. In this perspective, an eschatological view of this ecclesiastical tradition can help theology to break free from ιτς internal antagonisms and the self-sufficiency that runs through it, towards a critical and creative dialogue with the surrounding reality in the name of the truth in Christ.
Paul L. Gavrilyuk holds the Aquinas Chair in Theology and Philosophy at the Theology Department of the University of St. Thomas, St. Paul, Minnesota, USA. Born in Kiev, Ukraine, he studied physics at Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology in Russia (1988-1993). He was one of the first scholars from the former Soviet Union to come to the United States to pursue graduate work in theology. In 2001, he received his doctorate in patristics from the Graduate Program in Religious Studies at Southern Methodist University in Dallas, Texas. An Orthodox theologian and historian, Dr. Gavrilyuk specializes in Greek patristics and modern Orthodox theology. His areas of interest also include philosophy of religion, liturgical studies, and ecumenical studies. Translated into ten languages, his publications include the following books: The Suffering of the Impassible God: The Dialectics of Patristic Thought (Oxford, 2004), Histoire du catéchuménat dans l’église ancienne [A History of the Catechumenate in the Early Church] (Paris: Le Cerf, 2007); The Spiritual Senses: Perceiving God in Western Christianity, co-edited with Sarah Coakley (Cambridge, 2012), and Georges Florovsky and the Russian Religious Renaissance (Oxford, 2013). His numerous scholarly articles have appeared in The Journal of Theological Studies, Scottish Journal of Theology, Vigiliae Christianae, Modern Theology, First Things, Studia Liturgica, as well as Eastern European academic journals. He is also a regular contributor to encyclopedias, handbooks, dictionaries, and multi-author symposia.
Michel Stavrou is Professor of Dogmatic Theology at the Institute of Saint Sergius in Paris. A specialist in Byzantine theology, a doctor of history of religions (Paris IV Sorbonne), he has published the texts of the Byzantine theologian Nikiphoros Vlemmydis (13th century) in the collection “Sources Chretiènnes” (volume 517). He is also a research engineer at the National Center for Scientific Research of France and works at the Center for Byzantine Studies of the French College in Paris. Finally, he is editor-in-chief of the French Orthodox theological journal Contacts.
Haralambos Ventis was born in Athens, Greece in 1967. He studied theology at Holy Cross School of Theology in Boston, Massachusetts, and earned PhDs from Boston University (2001) and the Katholieke Universiteit Leuven (2014). He serves as Professor of Philosophy of Religion in the Department of Social Theology and Religion at the Faculty of Theology of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens. He has taught at the Hellenic Open University and the American College of Greece (Deree College). His scholarly interests include Kantian thought, Philosophy of Language, Postmodernism, contemporary Political Theory and Ethics (especially the Political Liberalism of John Rawls), and Philosophy of Religion.
Zoom is the leader in modern enterprise cloud communications.
