HELSINKI, Finland (The NYT) -- BY conventional lights, the Rev. Mitro Repo’s candidacy for the European Parliament never should have succeeded. As a Finnish Orthodox priest, he was bucking his superiors, who have strict rules about the mixing of politics and piety. As a Social Democrat, he was bucking the political tides sweeping Europe after the financial crisis.

But last Sunday Father Repo, 50, the son and grandson of priests, was elected as an independent candidate on the Social Democratic ticket as one of Finland’s 13 deputies in the 376-seat Parliament. It was a bittersweet victory in one respect: along the way, the bishops of the church forbade him to conduct religious services or wear the robe or pectoral cross or any other symbols of his priesthood. “They are accusing me of a crime,” he said of the church officials during the campaign. “I think it is an honor to do what I do.” But while the church may not have liked his politics, the people did, giving Father Repo one of two Social Democratic seats, one fewer than they won last time.
“Honestly, this was a surprise to me,” he told Finnish radio after the vote. His aim as a deputy, he said, would be to “promote a more humane Europe.” “For years I’ve been addressing problems of public life in Finland,” he said. “I will continue to do so in Europe.”
Elections to the European Parliament are usually about as exciting as watching grass grow. The Parliament is gradually gaining more power, but few Europeans care much about it. But the candidacy of Father Mitro, as everyone calls him here, injected unaccustomed energy.
A jovial and warm man, Father Repo has ruddy, round cheeks, a rust-colored beard and mustache, sparkling eyes behind wire-rimmed glasses and a deep laugh that would make him a great Santa, if only the beard were whiter. For all his spirituality, he lives life to the fullest.
On the campaign trail he used a chauffeur-driven Chrysler 300. He enjoys a good meal, and when he sat down recently in a local restaurant to talk with a visitor, he first ordered up two glasses of cabernet sauvignon.
“I think my candidacy was a great honor,” he said. “For me, and for my church.” Father Repo is not the first religious leader to enter the European Parliament. There were four Protestant ministers in the last one, including Ian Paisley, the firebrand Protestant evangelist from Northern Ireland who sat in the Parliament from its founding in 1979 until he retired in 2004.
“It’s difficult to perceive him as a priest,” said Juri Mykkanen, a professor of political science at Helsinki University, of Father Repo. “He is relaxed, ordinary, with a sense of irony.” Father Repo was “unusual,” he said, “more open to the world than we’re used to. Not everyone in the church likes that.” Mr. Mykkanen believes the church’s stance may even have lifted Father Repo’s popularity. “I am not sure that the bishops didn’t do the Social Democrats a favor,” he said.
ALWAYS drawn to art, Father Repo was sent as a teenager to Paris to study icon painting with the reigning master, Leonid A. Ouspensky. After teaching Latin, Greek and the New Testament for a while, he entered the priesthood in his early 30s, “the age of Christ,” he said, speaking fluent English and quoting the church fathers and the New Testament in Greek and Church Slavonic.