Bishop Kallistos Ware (1934 – 2022)
Bishop Kallistos Ware is a celebrated name in the Eastern Orthodox Churches of the Byzantine liturgical tradition as well as in western church circles. Born Timothy Ware in Bath, England, he was brought up in the Anglican Church tradition. At the age of 17 while he was a student, Timothy was once walking along the Buckingham Palace Road in London he casually got into a Russian church. He was fascinated by the music and liturgical rites of a church tradition totally unknown to him. It happened to be a parish of the Russian Orthodox Church Outside Russia. There he got the first taste of Orthodoxyhe . He explainezd much later his deeply emotional experience of the beauty of this worship in his book The Inner Kingdom (St Vladimir Seminary Press, 1993). As a scholar monk he taught for more than 3 decades at Oxford University. Kallistos (‘most beautiful’) was his monastic name, the name of an ancient Greek saint. Timothy Ware studied at Westminster School, London with a Royal Scholarship and graduated with high grades from Magdalene College. He was received in the Orthodox Church in 1958
He became well conversant in classic languages such as Greek and Latin and because of the strong inner call for monastic life, Timothy paid visits to monasteries in Jerusalem and Mount Athos in Greece. Eventually he became an inmate of the monastery in the Island of Patmos. This is where St John the Evangelist was staying in exile and wrote the Book of Revelation. Timothy was ordained to priesthood in 1966 by the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople. With this, he took oath as a full-fledged monk and received the monastic name Kallistos. In the same year, he was appointed as Lecturer in Eastern Orthodox Studies at Oxford. He was successor to the well known scholar Nicholas Zernov. It may be recalled that Nicholas Sernov was invited by Malankara Orthodox Church to be the Principal (1953 – 54) of the new Catholicate College, Pathanamthitta. (I fondly remember the hearty hospitality extended to me by Sernov and his wife Militsa during my visit as student to Oxford to attend the Patristic Congress in 1975). Bishop Kallistos continued at Oxford as Teacher for 35 long years. In the meantime, he was consecrated as the titular Bishop of the Greek Orthodox diocese of Diocleia. In some Eastern Orthodox Churches, there is a still the practice of ordaining distinguished lay theologians as well as widower priests who accept a monastic way of life as titular bishops. Even after his consecration as a bishop, Kallistos Ware continued to teach at Oxford and take pastoral care of the Greek Orthodox congregation there.
Bishop Kallistos had lots of painful experience during the early days of his switching over to Orthodox faith from Anglican tradition. The tension between the Greek Patriarchate and the Russian Orthodox Patriarchate of Moscow, the problems within the Russian Orthodox Church between the Patriarchate of Moscow and the community of Russian believers outside Russia, and the extreme conservative stand adopted by certain Orthodox monasteries and clergy were all stressful for a western Anglican young man who had accepted the Orthodox faith. He had to face critical attitudes of some among them who had apprehensions as to how an English man could ever understand the depth of Orthodoxy. It was also suspected by some Orthodox that his theology was more ecumenical than was warranted by the Orthodox tradition. But over the years his authentic witness to the Orthodox faith became more accepted by all . With his solid learning and sober faith he most meaningfully presented the message of Orthodoxy in the western without entering into any unnecessary arguments and disputes. Following the Russian revolution in 1917, many well known theologians like Lossky, Meyendorff, Schmemann, Evdokimov and Florovsky started teaching in west European and American countries, and they could attract many to the Orthodox tradition. Kallistos himself was influenced by them, and his own writings, speeches and way of life similarly brought many westerners to Orthodox faith and Eastern Spirituality.
I consider it a blessing to have met him several times, and learned from him. Once in a theological conference at Halki near Istanbul, I had to face a tricky situation and I recall with gratitude the way Bishop Kallistos interfered to my great relief. There was a famous Theological seminary of the Ecumenical Patriarchate in Halki Island. Turkish authorities had closed this college, but it is continuing as a monastic centre of the Orthodox Church. About some twenty five years ago, a conference of theological colleges of Eastern Churches were held here; On invitation, I had an opportunity to present a paper on Theological Education. As I was presenting my paper, I made mention of the Gurukula system of education traditionally followed in India until modern times, and I referred to the prevalent practice of presenting Jesus Christ as a Guru in Indian art forms. When I finished my presentation, two young theologians who I never knew before stood up and criticized my presentation in very strong language.. They argued that calling Jesus a Guru was heretical.. This was a time when Hare Krishna Movement and Yoga and various meditation techniques and gurus were seen as a threat to Orthodoxy in some countries. I was a little perplexed at their unexpected reaction. Bishop Kallistos understood my embarrassment. He stood up and very calmly explained: “Guru simply means teacher in Sanskrit. In the Gospels, Jesus has been often addressed as Rabbi or teacher. Fr George was not advocating the concept of guru as understood wrongly now- a- days by many people in Europe. In India, Guru is a highly respected term. We should also understand it in its authentic sense.” With these words, the atmosphere cooled down.
My good friend Dr Cherian Eapen (Moscow), who took great efforts to get several well known Russian/Greek Orthodox spiritual classics translated into Malayalam including five volumes of Philokalia, printed and distributed them freely, narrated to me how he met Bishop Kallistos at Oxford more than once in connection with the ‘mysterious problem’ of the translation of the 5th volume. Dr Eapen also went to Mount Athos and could get permission to see the original Greek version. He and I had occasion to invite Bishop Kallistos to visit Malankara Church, though he said he would not travel such long distances due to health issues. All his writings are obviously dealing with Eastern Orthodox spiritual, liturgical and theological tradition. Bishop Kallistos was certainly in favor of unofficial and official discussions for unity between Eastern Orthodox Churches and Oriental Orthodox Churches.
He, however, was well aware of the attitude of some extreme conservatives on both sides to the synod of Chalcedon in AD 431 despite the very successful outcome of the dialogue between the two Orthodox families. Members of the Malankara Orthodox Church would remember the crucial contributions of Metropolitan Paulos Mar Gregorios (Paul Verghese) and Dr Fr V C Samuel from the Malankara Church to the Dialogue since 1964. It was quite understandable Bishop Kallistos took extra caution in his writings and exhortations to avoid possibilities of controversy with regard to the Chalcedonian division of the Church. However, it would be good for Oriental Orthodox Churches to include his writings like the Orthodox Way in the theological curriculum because of the depth of his patristic erudition and his balanced view of the tradition of the undivided Church.
Encouraged by the late Catholicose Baselios Marthoma Paulos II, the clergy of the Kottayam diocese used to discuss The Orthodox Way in their monthly meetings. I gratefully remember how Abraham Chirackal, a front line activist of Indian Christian Orthodox Network (ICON), used to arrange for copies of the book for such discussions.
Combining in his personality deep learning, monastic simplicity, fervent liturgical piety, inner humility and luminous Christian hope Metropolitan Kallistos was an authentic witness to the Risen Christ in our time of much darkness, doubt and disorientation. Memory eternal. ( Translated by George Joseph, Kochi, from Malayalam)
