f. Vassilios Thermos

Rev. Vasileios Thermos, M.D., Ph.D., was born in 1957 at Lefkada, Greece. He studied at the Medical School of Athens University and after he graduated he studied at the Theological School of the same University. He was specialized in Child and Adolescent Psychiatry which he still practices in Athens. In 1986 he was ordained and keeps serving at the diocese of Viotia. He has been engaged into training programs for clergy in Greece, Cyprus, USA.

In 1996-97 he was a Visiting Scholar at Harvard Divinity School; he took classes also in Harvard School of Arts and Humanities, Boston College, Boston University, Andover Newton Theological School. In 1997 he received his PhD in Pastoral Psychology from the Theological School of Athens University. In 2014 he worked for 3 months as a Visiting Research Scholar at the Institute of Medical Humanities of the Medical School of Texas University on a project about homosexuality and contemporary gender theories. He has also conducted a research on clergy health and burnout.

He has written numerous books and articles in Greek; some of them have been translated into English, French, Russian, Romanian, Bulgarian, Serbian, Spanish, Italian, German, Finnish. Citations of his works currently number around 800 totally, 50 being in English. He is the editor of a journal in Greek (Psyches dromoi: Ways of the Soul), published every 6 months, on the relationships between theology/religion and psychiatry/psychology (first issue in May 2011).

In 2004 a master thesis on his total work appeared by Peter Kazaku at the Theological School of Balamand University, Lebanon. http://www.uni-muenster.de/CRS/Personen/petru_cazacu.html. This thesis was updated and enriched, thus forming the book «Orthodoxy and Psychoanalysis: Dirge or Polychronion to the Centuries-old Tradition?», which was published in 2013 by Peter Lang publications in the series ‘European University Studies’, volume 938. Also in 2020 another master thesis appeared in the School of Theology of the University of Wien, by Gabriella Moutsatsos: Ansätze der Οrthodoxen  Pastoralpsychologie der Gegenwart: Simeon Kragiopoulos und Vasileios Thermos.

During 2001-2013 he was a Visiting Professor of Pastoral Psychology and Psychology of Religion in the Theological Academy of the Orthodox Church of Albania. Since 2013 he teaches Pastoral Theology and Pastoral Psychology in the University Ecclesiastical Academy of Athens, where he is now an Associate Professor.

In 2017-18 his essay The Paradox of Mental Health Care and Spirituality: The Culture of Extreme Individualism as a Mediator was awarded the prize on the “Culture, Care, and Spirituality” contest by the Jean-Marc Fischer Foundation in Switzerland.

He has been a member of scientific committees organizing conferences on the relationship between theology and psychiatry/psychology. He has also given thousands of lectures to seminars, parents groups, clergy assemblies, camps, high schools, radio and TV etc. Also he has been invited in various ecclesiastical groups on homosexuality and gender issues.

His areas of interest are: Relationship between psychological sciences and religion; Psychology of religious beliefs and experiences; Dialogue between psychoanalysis and religion; Psychology of clergy and of the ecclesiastical organization; Psychology of culture; Religious development of child and adolescent; Language, psychology, and religion; Post-modernity and religion; Homosexuality and Christianity.

With his wife Asteroula (who is an artist for icons and metal crafts) have two daughters and two grandsons.