Nikolaos Loudovikos

Protopresbyter (Very Rev.) Fr. Nikolaos Loudovikos (Greek: π. Νικόλαος Λουδοβίκος) is a Greek theologian, priest, psychologist, author and professor.

Fr. Nikolaos Loudovikos was born in Volos, Greece in 1959. He studied Psychology and Education at the University of Athens, Theology at the University of Thessaloniki, Philosophy at the University of Sorbonne in Paris, Philosophy and Roman Catholic Theology at the Catholic Institute of Paris, Philosophy and Protestant Theology at the University of Cambridge (England). He received a Ph.D in 1989 from the Theological faculty of Aristotle University of Thessaloniki. The title of his dissertation was: The Eucharistic Ontology in the Theological Thought of St. Maximus the Confessor.

He has worked as a researcher at the Tyndale House (Cambridge) and has taught and lectured at the Centre for Advanced Religious and Theological Studies(CARTS) of the Department of Theology at the University of Cambridge, at Durham University, as well as at other Universities and Research Centres. Today he is the Chair of the Department of Theology and Pastoral Studies and a Professor of Dogmatics and Philosophy at the University Ecclesiastical Academy of Thessaloniki, a Visiting Professor at the Institute for Orthodox Christian Studies in Cambridge, and an Honorary Research Fellow at the University of Winchester, U.K.

Fr. Nikolaos Loudovikos is member and co-secretary (Orthodox) of the Saint Irenaeus Joint Orthodox-Catholic Working Group.

"Fortunately, Christianity is neither Platonism nor Stoicism. Everything in our body and soul is created by God, and as such, absolutely sacred. It is up to my own freedom to get angry, fall in love, play, create, eat, rejoice, be sorrowful, in such a manner that will bring me continuously closer to the Divine Source of my being: this is the meaning of the Incarnation. God does not call me to escape from this world, but to transform it into a place of His manifestation"

"Anselm says: why did the Incarnation happen? So that the Son of God could be punished in the place of man. Gregory the Theologian says: the Incarnation happened, 'because humanity must be sanctified by the Humanity of God'. Quite the opposite, in other words. And the Theologian continues: the only thing God wants, is to stop decay. Now try and build legalism on a position such as that of the Greek Fathers! It is impossible. That's why many of my fellow students in France marvelled at us Greeks, saying: «vous êtes anarchistes» (you are anarchists)!"