the mystery of the church

THE MYSTERY OF THE CHURCH

ACCORDING TO FATHER LEV*

by

Bishop Kallistos of Diokleia

A free spirit

Twenty-five years have passed since the death of the 'Monk of the Eastern Church',

Archimandrite Lev Gillet (1893-1980). His character, luminous yet enigmatic, remains vivid

in the memory of us who knew him personally. His was a personality full of contrasts. He

was diffident yet courageous, a pioneer and yet a traditionalist, solitary yet thirsty for

friendship, with a mordant Gallic wit yet with a heart of compassion. He could be moody,

abrupt, wayward, subject to waves of depression and to sudden outbursts of anger. Yet he

could be meek, gentle, generous, with a Christlike sensitivity to the fears and sorrows of

those who came to seek his help.

During his long life, Fr Lev embraced many different worlds: Studite monk in the

Eastern Catholic Church, rector of the first French-language Orthodox parish in Paris,

spiritual guide to the Orthodox Youth Movement in Syria and Lebanon, secretary of the

World Congress of Faiths, preacher at the French Protestant church in Soho, chaplain to the

Fellowship of St Alban and St Sergius, weekly celebrant in the chapel at St Basil's House.

He never held (or sought) any high office, he never established any large-scale project that

could serve as his memorial after his death – indeed, he even spoke of having 'a vocation of

loss' – yet he exercised a profound and creative influence upon the lives of countless men and

women, known and unknown.

For me, Fr Lev was above all a free spirit, prophetic and kenotic. He lived in great

poverty, in a small room, with a minimum of personal possessions. As his spiritual daughter

Elisabeth Behr-Sigel has rightly said, 'Everyone who knew Lev Gillet in England was struck

The Mystery of the Church according to Fr Zev

1

by the rigour with which he observed the monastic vow of poverty. All that he possessed

fitted into a shabby little suitcase: essentially his black monastic robes and a few worn

civilian garments …. He gave up wearing his ecclesiastical habit in town. It was replaced by

badly fitting civilian clothes which made him "look like a tramp", in the despairing words of

one of his Russian friends.'1

This kenoticism extended to every aspect of Fr Lev's church life. It is true that more

than once there was a possibility that he might have been elevated to the episcopate. But in

general he avoided honours and promotion, steering well clear of committees and

administrative responsibilities. He disliked 'churchiness', ritualism and pious self-inflation,

and could be sharply ironical about all such things. He carried out his pastoral ministry with

the utmost discretion, in a largely hidden manner, through informal addresses given to small

circles and through personal talks 'heart to heart', as he liked to say, in the corner of a park or

a café.

A free spirit: yes, indeed; but at the same time, obedient to the canonical rules of the

Church. During the twenty-eight years in which I knew him, he was always, by virtue of his

position as chaplain of the Fellowship, from the jurisdictional standpoint a faithful member of

1* This is a revised version of a talk originally given at the ‘round table’ held in memory of Fr

Lev at the Institut Saint-Serge in Paris on the Sunday of Orthodoxy, 20 March 2005:

abbreviated French text in SOP (Service Orthodoxe de Presse) 297 (April 2005), pp. 28–31.

For my own memories of Fr Lev, see my article, ‘Father Lev Gillet and the Fellowship of St

Alban and St Sergius’, Sobornost incorporating Eastern Churches Review 15:2 (1993), pp.

7–15.? Lev Gillet: 'A Monk of the Eastern Church', tr. Helen Wright (Oxford: Fellowship of St

Alban and St Sergius, 1999), p. 263 (hereafter: EBS). The original French text, Lev Gillet,

'Un Moine de L'Eglise d'Orient', was published by Cerf (Paris) in 1993. All of us who speak

or write about Fr Lev are deeply in debt to Elisabeth Behr-Sigel for her excellent biography,

based on half a century of personal friendship. In my quotations, I have sometimes modified

the English version.


2

the Ecumenical Patriarchate. But at the same time he was also a close friend of Metropolitan

Antony of Sourozh, of the Moscow Patriarchate, whom Fr Lev considered to be (as he put it)

'of all the Orthodox priests in London, the one who carries within him the most living

spiritual flame'.2 After Fr Lev's death, his funeral was celebrated in the Greek Cathedral at

Moscow Road, as was to be expected since he belonged to the Ecumenical Patriarchate; but it

was his friend the Russian Metropolitan Antony who presided at the service and delivered the

homily, speaking of Fr Lev's personality, 'so tormented, at times so disconcerting', and of 'the

immense complexity of his journey'.3 It was altogether appropriate that his funeral should

have been conducted in a Greek church by a Russian bishop; for Fr Lev was always what the

French call 'un passeur', 'a ferry-man' – a builder of bridges between separated worlds.

I first met Fr Lev in 1952, but it was not until 1966, when I became priest of the

Greek parish in Oxford, that I came to know him more closely. The situation of the Orthodox

congregation in Oxford, unusual if not unique within the Orthodox Church of the 'diaspora',

appealed to Fr Lev as a bridge-builder. Canonically we are two parishes, the one under the

Ecumenical Patriarchate, the other under the Patriarchate of Moscow, each with its own

priest, and its own parish council and officers. But in practice we are a single worshipping

community. Together the two parishes have built a church which they share on a footing of

entire equality. Each Sunday there is only one celebration of the Divine Liturgy, in which we

invariably commemorate the bishops of both jurisdictions.

For Fr Lev, all this was highly significant and precious. He often came to Oxford,

staying with his friend Nadejda Gorodetzky, and he liked to celebrate the Divine Liturgy in

our church. 'By giving myself, I receive much and feel myself more of a priest', he said,

specifically with reference to his pastoral work at Oxford.4 'This parish is very dear to me',

2 EBS, pp. 324-5.

3 EBS, p. 447.

4 EBS, p. 423.


3

he wrote. '… You all have a place in my heart …. When I was called to exercise a ministry

among you, I experienced in some measure how it is that a community is created, - or rather,

how the Church itself is created.’5 In his view, the little pan-Orthodox community of Oxford,

for all its fragility, was a sign full of hope. It spoke to him of that spirit of conciliarity, of

sobornost, which ought to be the mark of Orthodoxy in the western world, and which in

practice is all too often singularly lacking. As he saw it, it showed how the uncanonical

fragmentation of western Orthodoxy, with its national rivalries and ethnocentric narrowness,

could and should be transcended in the risen Christ. When today at moments of

discouragement I recall his discreet yet decisive support in times long ago, I feel inspired to

continue with my ecclesial journey.

Three 'notes' of the Church

'I experienced in some measure … how the Church itself is created': these words of Fr Lev

lead me to ask what in fact was his vision of the Church. Of course, we should not expect to

discover in his works a developed and systematic ecclesiology; he did not write that kind of

book. But here and there we find insights that, however brief, are full of wisdom. Even if he

personally was by character quixotic and unpredictable, yet in his theology of the Church he

is sober and carefully balanced.

First of all, his approach to the mystery of the Church is firmly Christocentric.

'Where Jesus Christ is, there is the Church', he wrote with characteristic simplicity in The

Jesus Prayer. 'Whoever is in Jesus is in the Church. The name of Jesus is a means of uniting

us to the Church, for the Church is in Christ.'6 His definition of what it is to be Orthodox is

clear and concise: 'The word "Orthodoxy" should be synonymous with two great things – to

5 Quoted in my article, 'Father Lev Gillet and the Fellowship', p. 14.


4

believe in Jesus Christ, to live in Jesus Christ.'7 At first sight the definition may appear

oversimplified, but surely in these few words everything is included.

As presence and body of Christ, the Church is manifestly a eucharistic organism. But

Fr Lev, while fully agreeing with this, did not place heavy emphasis upon the Church's

eucharistic dimension. He insisted above all on three fundamental 'notes' of the Church: love,

tradition and freedom. 'Standing half-way between authoritarianism and individualism', he

wrote, 'the Orthodox Church is a Church both of tradition and of liberty. It is above all a

Church of love. It depends not on external power, nor on individual efforts, but only on

divine grace and brotherly charity, so as to maintain in unity and to animate the members of

the mystical body of Christ.'8

Love. Fr Lev appealed to the diaconal exhortation in the Liturgy, immediately before

the Creed, 'Let us love one another, that with one mind we may confess …', together with the

response of the people, '…. Father, Son and Holy Spirit, Trinity one in essence and

undivided.' 'This moment is of the greatest importance', he wrote in his Notes on the Liturgy,

'since these words that have just been spoken express the very nature of the Church. In and

by a common love the Church proclaims its faith in the ultimate community of love which is

formed by the Father, the Son and the Holy Spirit. The Church itself is a community of love.

As such, it declares itself to be as well a community of faith. Those who refuse to love others

cannot worthily confess the love of the three divine Persons. I cannot say, "I believe in

Love," if at the same time I do not include in that divine love every man and every woman

created in the image of God.'9 'At the Last Judgement', affirmed Fr Lev, 'we shall be judged

not on our failings but on the love to which we have borne witness.'10

6 The Jesus Prayer, revised edn (Crestwood, NY: St Vladimir's Seminary Press, 1987), p.100

(translation corrected).

7 EBS, p.151.

8 EBS, p.151.


5

Without love, there is no Church. When we appeal to canonical rules and so-called

jurisdictional 'rights', if we speak without love, in reality we are placing ourselves outside the

Church. Fr Lev was in full agreement with Alexis Khomiakov: 'The Church is the revelation

of the Holy Spirit to the mutual love of Christians.'11

Tradition. Addressing a French Orthodox audience, Fr Lev insisted that for them

'Tradition' signifies not only, and indeed not primarily, Greek, Arab, Russian, Serbian or

Romanian tradition, but specifically French tradition. As he wrote in 1929, in the bulletin of

the first French-speaking parish in Paris, 'As French people by language and nationality, we

feel ourselves linked to the ancient "Orthodox" tradition in France, to the “most Christian"

France of the centuries when East and West were not separated. St Irenaeus … St Denis, St

Martin of Tours, St Geneviève: these are some of the great names with whom we wish to

associate ourselves. But we will not feel alien either to St Louis or to Joan of Arc or to

Pascal. And everything good and noble that the French heart and French intelligence of

today has created, this too we wish to feel our own, as we dedicate it to Christ and make it

Orthodox.'12 Sixty-six years later, these words remain always valid and vital – valid not only

for French but for English Orthodox: we should regard, as part of our Orthodox heritage, not

only pre-schism saints such as Columba, Cuthbert or Theodore of Tarsus, but equally such

later figures as Julian of Norwich, George Herbert, William Blake or T.S. Eliot. They, too,

are not 'alien' to us as English Orthodox.

9 Serve the Lord with Gladness, tr. John Breck (Crestwood, NY: St Vladimir's Seminary

Press, 1990), p.35.

10 EBS, p.388.

11 Ignotus [pseudonym of Alexis Khomiakov], Encore quelques mots d'un chrétien orthodoxe

sur les confessions occidentale (Leipzig, 1858), p.70.

12 EBS, p.151.


6

'It is possible, even natural,' Fr Lev added, 'that French Orthodoxy, when it has

reached a certain stage of development, should become autonomous.'13 The same thing is

'possible, even natural' for English Orthodoxy as well.

Freedom. This recurs as a leitmotif throughout the prophetic testimony of the 'Monk

of the Eastern Church'. He detested all forms of ecclesiastical bullying, of moral blackmail

and spiritual coercion, especially when practised towards the weak and vulnerable. To give

just one example of his regard for freedom: when he spoke about Papal primacy, he insisted

also upon 'liberty in the Holy Spirit'. The Orthodox, he said, could accept and welcome a

primacy expressed in terms of 'the old Roman formulas of sollicitudo omnium ecclesiarum

["the care of all the Churches"] and servus servorum ["the servant of the servants"].' They

could accept a 'primacy of humility, service and love … not simply a primacy of honour or a

nebulous sort of leadership, but a pastoral mission that is unique in nature'. In the same

breath, however – and this is altogether characteristic of Fr Lev – he added: 'The Orthodox

cannot consider complete any ecclesiology that does not hold in harmony and balance these

three things: liberty in the Holy Spirit, the Catholic and Apostolic tradition, and the charisma

of Peter.'14

Universality without relativism

Elisabeth Behr-Sigel has very rightly stated that Fr Lev was inspired by ‘the vision of an

Orthodoxy that is universalist and evangelical'.15 But there was nothing relativist about his

universalism. Committed to 'spiritual ecumenism', he often affirmed: 'Christ is present in all

the Churches. Search and you will find.'16 Yet, at the same time, for him Orthodoxy

13 EBS, p.151.

14 EBS, p.297.

15 EBS, p.148.

16 EBS, p.267.


7

possessed a fullness of truth that was not to be found elsewhere. Speaking of Fr. Lev's

decision to enter the Orthodox Church in 1928 – I do not think that he would have wished to

call it a 'conversion' – Mme Behr-Sigel comments: 'No abjuration of faith had been imposed

on him … In his sacramental union with the Orthodox Church, Hieromonk Lev did not

repudiate the grace that he had received in the Church of his baptism …. From one plenitude,

he had gone to a plenitude that was yet greater.'17 As Fr Lev himself wrote to his older

brother, 'I have gone where I have found – I would not say another light – but the same light

of Christ to a purer degree.'18

In his spiritual ministry, the 'Monk of the Eastern Church' was extremely open to all

the world – to Pentecostalists, French Protestants and Quakers, to Jews and Muslims – open,

perhaps above all, to those who had lost all faith in God, but who in the depths of their heart

were not far from the Kingdom of Heaven. In common with the author of the Fourth Gospel

and the Greek Apologists of the second century such as Justin Martyr, he believed that the

light of Christ 'enlightens everyone who comes into the world' (John 1:9), and that the creator

Logos has sown seeds of the truth, logoi spermatikoi, in every human heart.19 He appreciated

spiritual authenticity wherever he encountered it, but he always avoided any compromise that

might lead to a syncretist amalgam. Precisely because he was firmly rooted in the Church, he

was able to discern the Spirit of God everywhere.

Faithful to his 'universalist and evangelical' vision, Fr Lev never engaged in

aggressive proselytism. Any such practice was entirely foreign to him. Yet, when he found

people who felt deeply drawn to the Orthodox Church, he did not seek to dissuade them. In

the 'Monk of the Eastern Church', then, we see at that same time both openness and fidelity:

17 EBS, p.121.

18 EBS, p.130.

19 Justin, Apology 1: 44; 2: 8.


8

openness to every movement of the Spirit in the heart of each person, fidelity to his own

particular vocation as a priest in the Orthodox Church.

It is noteworthy that he seems never to have offered 'eucharistic hospitality' to non-

Orthodox, even within the unobtrusive setting of the domestic chapel at St Basil's House. In

the words of his biographer, 'While inwardly free – indeed, precisely because of this great

interior freedom – as a priest commissioned by the Orthodox Church he adhered to its

canonical rules.'20

Fr Lev was sharply aware of the paradoxical and antinomic character of the Church

on earth: undefiled Body of Christ, but also community of sinners. 'We do not wish to

separate or oppose the visible and invisible aspects of the Church', he wrote. We must never

lose sight of 'the spotless, spiritual and eternal aspect of the Church, which transcends every

earthly manifestation and which no schism can destroy'. But on the other hand we should

never seek 'to dissociate ourselves from the existence and the problems of the Church on

earth, or to close our eyes to the imperfections and disunity of Christians'.21 Yet those

'imperfections' and this 'disunity', while they often caused Fr Lev profound anguish, never

made him forget the glory of the Transfiguration. For Fr Lev the Church was neither an

institution nor an organization, but an expression of prayer, worship and doxology. It was not

by chance that he dedicated his book Orthodox Spirituality to 'the praying Church of Christ'.22

Such is the image of the Church that we may discern in the writings of Fr Lev, ferry-

man and bridge-builder. Some words that he wrote about Kierkegaard apply also to Fr Lev

himself: 'a suffering pilgrim, walking in darkness'.23 Yes, Fr Lev was truly a pilgrim – a

pilgrim of unity – who suffered greatly. But for him, with his radical faith in Christ crucified

20 EBS, p.319.

21 The Jesus Prayer, p.100.

22 Orthodox Spirituality: An Outline of the Orthodox Ascetical and Mystical Tradition

(London: SPCK, 1945), p.x.

23 EBS, p.349.


9

and risen, the darkness was full of light. 'Behold, through the Cross joy has come to all the

world.'24

24 Hymn at Sunday Matins (Orthros) in the Byzantine rite.


10

the mystery of the church

Documents