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ENCYCLICAL LETTER
SPE
SALVI
OF THE SUPREME PONTIFF
BENEDICT XVI
TO THE BISHOPS
PRIESTS
AND DEACONS
MEN AND WOMEN RELIGIOUS
AND ALL THE LAY FAITHFUL
ON CHRISTIAN HOPE
Introduction
1. “SPE SALVI facti sumus”—in hope we were saved, says Saint Paul to the Romans, and likewise
to us (Rom 8:24). According to the Christian faith, “redemption”—salvation—is not simply a
given. Redemption is offered to us in the sense that we have been given hope, trustworthy hope, by virtue of which we can
face our present: the present, even if it is arduous, can be lived and accepted if it leads towards a goal, if we can be sure
of this goal, and if this goal is great enough to justify the effort of the journey. Now the question immediately arises:
what sort of hope could ever justify the statement that, on the basis of that hope and simply because it exists, we are redeemed?
And what sort of certainty is involved here?
Faith is Hope
2. Before turning our attention to these timely questions, we must listen a little more closely to the Bible's testimony
on hope. “Hope”, in fact, is a key word in Biblical faith—so much so that in several passages the words
“faith” and “hope” seem interchangeable. Thus the Letter to the Hebrews closely links the “fullness
of faith” (10:22) to “the confession of our hope without wavering” (10:23). Likewise, when the First
Letter of Peter exhorts Christians to be always ready to give an answer concerning the logos—the meaning
and the reason—of their hope (cf. 3:15), “hope” is equivalent to “faith”. We see how decisively
the self-understanding of the early Christians was shaped by their having received the gift of a trustworthy hope, when we
compare the Christian life with life prior to faith, or with the situation of the followers of other religions. Paul reminds
the Ephesians that before their encounter with Christ they were “without hope and without God in the world” (Eph
2:12). Of course he knew they had had gods, he knew they had had a religion, but their gods had proved questionable, and no
hope emerged from their contradictory myths. Notwithstanding their gods, they were “without God” and consequently
found themselves in a dark world, facing a dark future. In nihil ab nihilo quam cito recidimus (How quickly we fall
back from nothing to nothing): 1 so says an epitaph of that period. In this phrase we see in no uncertain terms
the point Paul was making. In the same vein he says to the Thessalonians: you must not “grieve as others do who have
no hope” (1 Th 4:13). Here too we see as a distinguishing mark of Christians the fact that they have a future:
it is not that they know the details of what awaits them, but they know in general terms that their life will not end in emptiness.
Only when the future is certain as a positive reality does it become possible to live the present as well. So now we can say:
Christianity was not only “good news”—the communication of a hitherto unknown content. In our language we
would say: the Christian message was not only “informative” but “performative”. That means: the Gospel
is not merely a communication of things that can be known—it is one that makes things happen and is life-changing. The
dark door of time, of the future, has been thrown open. The one who has hope lives differently; the one who hopes has been
granted the gift of a new life.
3. Yet at this point a question arises: in what does this hope consist which, as hope, is “redemption”? The
essence of the answer is given in the phrase from the Letter to the Ephesians quoted above: the Ephesians, before their
encounter with Christ, were without hope because they were “without God in the world”. To come to know God—the
true God—means to receive hope. We who have always lived with the Christian concept of God, and have grown accustomed
to it, have almost ceased to notice that we possess the hope that ensues from a real encounter with this God. The example
of a saint of our time can to some degree help us understand what it means to have a real encounter with this God for the
first time. I am thinking of the African Josephine Bakhita, canonized by Pope John Paul II. She was born around 1869—she
herself did not know the precise date—in Darfur in Sudan. At the age of nine, she was kidnapped by slave-traders, beaten
till she bled, and sold five times in the slave-markets of Sudan. Eventually she found herself working as a slave for the
mother and the wife of a general, and there she was flogged every day till she bled; as a result of this she bore 144 scars
throughout her life. Finally, in 1882, she was bought by an Italian merchant for the Italian consul Callisto Legnani, who
returned to Italy as the Mahdists advanced. Here, after the terrifying “masters” who had owned her up to that
point, Bakhita came to know a totally different kind of “master”—in Venetian dialect, which she was now
learning, she used the name “paron” for the living God, the God of Jesus Christ. Up to that time she had
known only masters who despised and maltreated her, or at best considered her a useful slave. Now, however, she heard that
there is a “paron” above all masters, the Lord of all lords, and that this Lord is good, goodness in person.
She came to know that this Lord even knew her, that he had created her—that he actually loved her. She too was loved,
and by none other than the supreme “Paron”, before whom all other masters are themselves no more than lowly
servants. She was known and loved and she was awaited. What is more, this master had himself accepted the destiny of being
flogged and now he was waiting for her “at the Father's right hand”. Now she had “hope” —no
longer simply the modest hope of finding masters who would be less cruel, but the great hope: “I am definitively loved
and whatever happens to me—I am awaited by this Love. And so my life is good.” Through the knowledge of this hope
she was “redeemed”, no longer a slave, but a free child of God. She understood what Paul meant when he reminded
the Ephesians that previously they were without hope and without God in the world—without hope because without
God. Hence, when she was about to be taken back to Sudan, Bakhita refused; she did not wish to be separated again from her
“Paron”. On 9 January 1890, she was baptized and confirmed and received her first Holy Communion from the
hands of the Patriarch of Venice. On 8 December 1896, in Verona, she took her vows in the Congregation of the Canossian Sisters
and from that time onwards, besides her work in the sacristy and in the porter's lodge at the convent, she made several journeys
round Italy in order to promote the missions: the liberation that she had received through her encounter with the God of Jesus
Christ, she felt she had to extend, it had to be handed on to others, to the greatest possible number of people. The hope
born in her which had “redeemed” her she could not keep to herself; this hope had to reach many, to reach everybody.
The concept of faith-based hope in the New Testament and the early Church
4. We have raised the question: can our encounter with the God who in Christ has shown us his face and opened his heart
be for us too not just “informative” but “performative”—that is to say, can it change our lives,
so that we know we are redeemed through the hope that it expresses? Before attempting to answer the question, let us return
once more to the early Church. It is not difficult to realize that the experience of the African slave-girl Bakhita was also
the experience of many in the period of nascent Christianity who were beaten and condemned to slavery. Christianity did not
bring a message of social revolution like that of the ill-fated Spartacus, whose struggle led to so much bloodshed. Jesus
was not Spartacus, he was not engaged in a fight for political liberation like Barabbas or Bar- Kochba. Jesus, who himself
died on the Cross, brought something totally different: an encounter with the Lord of all lords, an encounter with the living
God and thus an encounter with a hope stronger than the sufferings of slavery, a hope which therefore transformed life and
the world from within. What was new here can be seen with the utmost clarity in Saint Paul's Letter to Philemon. This
is a very personal letter, which Paul wrote from prison and entrusted to the runaway slave Onesimus for his master, Philemon.
Yes, Paul is sending the slave back to the master from whom he had fled, not ordering but asking: “I appeal to you for
my child ... whose father I have become in my imprisonment ... I am sending him back to you, sending my very heart ... perhaps
this is why he was parted from you for a while, that you might have him back for ever, no longer as a slave but more than
a slave, as a beloved brother ...” (Philem 10-16). Those who, as far as their civil status is concerned, stand
in relation to one an other as masters and slaves, inasmuch as they are members of the one Church have become brothers and
sisters—this is how Christians addressed one another. By virtue of their Baptism they had been reborn, they had been
given to drink of the same Spirit and they received the Body of the Lord together, alongside one another. Even if external
structures remained unaltered, this changed society from within. When the Letter to the Hebrews says that Christians
here on earth do not have a permanent homeland, but seek one which lies in the future (cf. Heb 11:13-16; Phil 3:20),
this does not mean for one moment that they live only for the future: present society is recognized by Christians as an exile;
they belong to a new society which is the goal of their common pilgrimage and which is anticipated in the course of that pilgrimage.
5. We must add a further point of view. The First Letter to the Corinthians (1:18-31) tells us that many of the
early Christians belonged to the lower social strata, and precisely for this reason were open to the experience of new hope,
as we saw in the example of Bakhita. Yet from the beginning there were also conversions in the aristocratic and cultured circles,
since they too were living “without hope and without God in the world”. Myth had lost its credibility; the Roman
State religion had become fossilized into simple ceremony which was scrupulously carried out, but by then it was merely “political
religion”. Philosophical rationalism had confined the gods within the realm of unreality. The Divine was seen in various
ways in cosmic forces, but a God to whom one could pray did not exist. Paul illustrates the essential problem of the religion
of that time quite accurately when he contrasts life “according to Christ” with life under the dominion of the
“elemental spirits of the universe” (Col 2:8). In this regard a text by Saint Gregory Nazianzen is enlightening.
He says that at the very moment when the Magi, guided by the star, adored Christ the new king, astrology came to an end, because
the stars were now moving in the orbit determined by Christ.2 This scene, in fact, overturns the world-view of
that time, which in a different way has become fashionable once again today. It is not the elemental spirits of the universe,
the laws of matter, which ultimately govern the world and mankind, but a personal God governs the stars, that is, the universe;
it is not the laws of matter and of evolution that have the final say, but reason, will, love—a Person. And if we know
this Person and he knows us, then truly the inexorable power of material elements no longer has the last word; we are not
slaves of the universe and of its laws, we are free. In ancient times, honest enquiring minds were aware of this. Heaven is
not empty. Life is not a simple product of laws and the randomness of matter, but within everything and at the same time above
everything, there is a personal will, there is a Spirit who in Jesus has revealed himself as Love.3
6. The sarcophagi of the early Christian era illustrate this concept visually—in the context of death, in the face
of which the question concerning life's meaning becomes unavoidable. The figure of Christ is interpreted on ancient sarcophagi
principally by two images: the philosopher and the shepherd. Philosophy at that time was not generally seen as a difficult
academic discipline, as it is today. Rather, the philosopher was someone who knew how to teach the essential art: the art
of being authentically human—the art of living and dying. To be sure, it had long since been realized that many of the
people who went around pretending to be philosophers, teachers of life, were just charlatans who made money through their
words, while having nothing to say about real life. All the more, then, the true philosopher who really did know how to point
out the path of life was highly sought after. Towards the end of the third century, on the sarcophagus of a child in Rome,
we find for the first time, in the context of the resurrection of Lazarus, the figure of Christ as the true philosopher, holding
the Gospel in one hand and the philosopher's travelling staff in the other. With his staff, he conquers death; the Gospel
brings the truth that itinerant philosophers had searched for in vain. In this image, which then became a common feature of
sarcophagus art for a long time, we see clearly what both educated and simple people found in Christ: he tells us who man
truly is and what a man must do in order to be truly human. He shows us the way, and this way is the truth. He himself is
both the way and the truth, and therefore he is also the life which all of us are seeking. He also shows us the way beyond
death; only someone able to do this is a true teacher of life. The same thing becomes visible in the image of the shepherd.
As in the representation of the philosopher, so too through the figure of the shepherd the early Church could identify with
existing models of Roman art. There the shepherd was generally an expression of the dream of a tranquil and simple life, for
which the people, amid the confusion of the big cities, felt a certain longing. Now the image was read as part of a new scenario
which gave it a deeper content: “The Lord is my shepherd: I shall not want ... Even though I walk through the valley
of the shadow of death, I fear no evil, because you are with me ...” (Ps 23 [22]:1, 4). The true shepherd is
one who knows even the path that passes through the valley of death; one who walks with me even on the path of final solitude,
where no one can accompany me, guiding me through: he himself has walked this path, he has descended into the kingdom of death,
he has conquered death, and he has returned to accompany us now and to give us the certainty that, together with him, we can
find a way through. The realization that there is One who even in death accompanies me, and with his “rod and his staff
comforts me”, so that “I fear no evil” (cf. Ps 23 [22]:4)—this was the new “hope”
that arose over the life of believers.
7. We must return once more to the New Testament. In the eleventh chapter of the Letter to the Hebrews (v. 1) we
find a kind of definition of faith which closely links this virtue with hope. Ever since the Reformation there has been a
dispute among exegetes over the central word of this phrase, but today a way towards a common interpretation seems to be opening
up once more. For the time being I shall leave this central word untranslated. The sentence therefore reads as follows: “Faith
is the hypostasis of things hoped for; the proof of things not seen”. For the Fathers and for the theologians
of the Middle Ages, it was clear that the Greek word hypostasis was to be rendered in Latin with the term substantia.
The Latin translation of the text produced at the time of the early Church therefore reads: Est autem fides sperandarum
substantia rerum, argumentum non apparentium—faith is the “substance” of things hoped for; the proof
of things not seen. Saint Thomas Aquinas,4 using the terminology of the philosophical tradition to which he belonged,
explains it as follows: faith is a habitus, that is, a stable disposition of the spirit, through which eternal life
takes root in us and reason is led to consent to what it does not see. The concept of “substance” is therefore
modified in the sense that through faith, in a tentative way, or as we might say “in embryo”—and thus according
to the “substance”—there are already present in us the things that are hoped for: the whole, true life.
And precisely because the thing itself is already present, this presence of what is to come also creates certainty: this “thing”
which must come is not yet visible in the external world (it does not “appear”), but because of the fact that,
as an initial and dynamic reality, we carry it within us, a certain perception of it has even now come into existence. To
Luther, who was not particularly fond of the Letter to the Hebrews, the concept of “substance”, in the
context of his view of faith, meant nothing. For this reason he understood the term hypostasis/substance not in the
objective sense (of a reality present within us), but in the subjective sense, as an expression of an interior attitude, and
so, naturally, he also had to understand the term argumentum as a disposition of the subject. In the twentieth century
this interpretation became prevalent—at least in Germany—in Catholic exegesis too, so that the ecumenical translation
into German of the New Testament, approved by the Bishops, reads as follows: Glaube aber ist: Feststehen in dem, was man
erhofft, Überzeugtsein von dem, was man nicht sieht (faith is: standing firm in what one hopes, being convinced of what
one does not see). This in itself is not incorrect, but it is not the meaning of the text, because the Greek term used (elenchos)
does not have the subjective sense of “conviction” but the objective sense of “proof”. Rightly, therefore,
recent Prot- estant exegesis has arrived at a different interpretation: “Yet there can be no question but that this
classical Protestant understanding is untenable.”5 Faith is not merely a personal reaching out towards things
to come that are still totally absent: it gives us something. It gives us even now something of the reality we are waiting
for, and this present reality constitutes for us a “proof” of the things that are still unseen. Faith draws the
future into the present, so that it is no longer simply a “not yet”. The fact that this future exists changes
the present; the present is touched by the future reality, and thus the things of the future spill over into those of the
present and those of the present into those of the future.
8. This explanation is further strengthened and related to daily life if we consider verse 34 of the tenth chapter of the
Letter to the Hebrews, which is linked by vocabulary and content to this definition of hope-filled faith and prepares
the way for it. Here the author speaks to believers who have undergone the experience of persecution and he says to them:
“you had compassion on the prisoners, and you joyfully accepted the plundering of your property (hyparchonton—Vg.
bonorum), since you knew that you yourselves had a better possession (hyparxin—Vg. substantiam) and
an abiding one.” Hyparchonta refers to property, to what in earthly life constitutes the means of support, indeed
the basis, the “substance” for life, what we depend upon. This “substance”, life's normal source of
security, has been taken away from Christians in the course of persecution. They have stood firm, though, because they considered
this material substance to be of little account. They could abandon it because they had found a better “basis”
for their existence—a basis that abides, that no one can take away. We must not overlook the link between these two
types of “substance”, between means of support or material basis and the word of faith as the “basis”,
the “substance” that endures. Faith gives life a new basis, a new foundation on which we can stand, one which
relativizes the habitual foundation, the reliability of material income. A new freedom is created with regard to this habitual
foundation of life, which only appears to be capable of providing support, although this is obviously not to deny its
normal meaning. This new freedom, the awareness of the new “substance” which we have been given, is revealed not
only in martyrdom, in which people resist the overbearing power of ideology and its political organs and, by their death,
renew the world. Above all, it is seen in the great acts of renunciation, from the monks of ancient times to Saint Francis
of Assisi and those of our contemporaries who enter modern religious Institutes and movements and leave everything for love
of Christ, so as to bring to men and women the faith and love of Christ, and to help those who are suffering in body and spirit.
In their case, the new “substance” has proved to be a genuine “substance”; from the hope of these
people who have been touched by Christ, hope has arisen for others who were living in darkness and without hope. In their
case, it has been demonstrated that this new life truly possesses and is “substance” that calls forth life for
others. For us who contemplate these figures, their way of acting and living is de facto a “proof” that
the things to come, the promise of Christ, are not only a reality that we await, but a real presence: he is truly the “philosopher”
and the “shepherd” who shows us what life is and where it is to be found.
9. In order to understand more deeply this reflection on the two types of substance—hypostasis and hyparchonta—and
on the two approaches to life expressed by these terms, we must continue with a brief consideration of two words pertinent
to the discussion which can be found in the tenth chapter of the Letter to the Hebrews. I refer to the words hypomone
(10:36) and hypostole (10:39). Hypo- mone is normally translated as “patience”—perseverance,
constancy. Knowing how to wait, while patiently enduring trials, is necessary for the believer to be able to “receive
what is promised” (10:36). In the religious context of ancient Judaism, this word was used expressly for the expectation
of God which was characteristic of Israel, for their persevering faithfulness to God on the basis of the certainty of the
Covenant in a world which contradicts God. Thus the word indicates a lived hope, a life based on the certainty of hope. In
the New Testament this expectation of God, this standing with God, takes on a new significance: in Christ, God has revealed
himself. He has already communicated to us the “substance” of things to come, and thus the expectation of God
acquires a new certainty.
It is the expectation of things to come from the perspective of a present that is already given. It is a looking-forward
in Christ's presence, with Christ who is present, to the perfecting of his Body, to his definitive coming. The word hypostole,
on the other hand, means shrinking back through lack of courage to speak openly and frankly a truth that may be dangerous.
Hiding through a spirit of fear leads to “destruction” (Heb 10:39). “God did not give us a spirit
of timidity but a spirit of power and love and self-control”—that, by contrast, is the beautiful way in which
the Second Letter to Timothy (1:7) describes the fundamental attitude of the Christian.
Eternal life – what is it?
10. We have spoken thus far of faith and hope in the New Testament and in early Christianity; yet it has always been clear
that we are referring not only to the past: the entire reflection concerns living and dying in general, and therefore it also
concerns us here and now. So now we must ask explicitly: is the Christian faith also for us today a life-changing and life-sustaining
hope?
Is it “performative” for us—is it a message which shapes our life in a new way, or is it just “information”
which, in the meantime, we have set aside and which now seems to us to have been superseded by more recent information? In
the search for an answer, I would like to begin with the classical form of the dialogue with which the rite of Baptism expressed
the reception of an infant into the community of believers and the infant's rebirth in Christ. First of all the priest asked
what name the parents had chosen for the child, and then he continued with the question: “What do you ask of the Church?”
Answer: “Faith”. “And what does faith give you?” “Eternal life”. According to this dialogue,
the parents were seeking access to the faith for their child, communion with believers, because they saw in faith the key
to “eternal life”. Today as in the past, this is what being baptized, becoming Christians, is all about: it is
not just an act of socialization within the community, not simply a welcome into the Church. The parents expect more for the
one to be baptized: they expect that faith, which includes the corporeal nature of the Church and her sacraments, will give
life to their child—eternal life. Faith is the substance of hope. But then the question arises: do we really want this—to
live eternally? Perhaps many people reject the faith today simply because they do not find the prospect of eternal life attractive.
What they desire is not eternal life at all, but this present life, for which faith in eternal life seems something of an
impediment. To continue living for ever —endlessly—appears more like a curse than a gift. Death, admittedly, one
would wish to postpone for as long as possible. But to live always, without end—this, all things considered, can only
be monotonous and ultimately unbearable. This is precisely the point made, for example, by Saint Ambrose, one of the Church
Fathers, in the funeral discourse for his deceased brother Satyrus: “Death was not part of nature; it became part of
nature. God did not decree death from the beginning; he prescribed it as a remedy. Human life, because of sin ... began to
experience the burden of wretchedness in unremitting labour and unbearable sorrow. There had to be a limit to its evils; death
had to restore what life had forfeited. Without the assistance of grace, immortality is more of a burden than a blessing.”
6 A little earlier, Ambrose had said: “Death is, then, no cause for mourning, for it is the cause of mankind's
salvation.” 7
11. Whatever precisely Saint Ambrose may have meant by these words, it is true that to eliminate death or to postpone it
more or less indefinitely would place the earth and humanity in an impossible situation, and even for the individual would
bring no benefit. Obviously there is a contradiction in our attitude, which points to an inner contradiction in our very existence.
On the one hand, we do not want to die; above all, those who love us do not want us to die. Yet on the other hand, neither
do we want to continue living indefinitely, nor was the earth created with that in view. So what do we really want? Our paradoxical
attitude gives rise to a deeper question: what in fact is “life”? And what does “eternity” really
mean? There are moments when it suddenly seems clear to us: yes, this is what true “life” is—this is what
it should be like. Besides, what we call “life” in our everyday language is not real “life” at all.
Saint Augustine, in the extended letter on prayer which he addressed to Proba, a wealthy Roman widow and mother of three consuls,
once wrote this: ultimately we want only one thing—”the blessed life”, the life which is simply life, simply
“happiness”. In the final analysis, there is nothing else that we ask for in prayer. Our journey has no other
goal—it is about this alone. But then Augustine also says: looking more closely, we have no idea what we ultimately
desire, what we would really like. We do not know this reality at all; even in those moments when we think we can reach out
and touch it, it eludes us. “We do not know what we should pray for as we ought,” he says, quoting Saint Paul
(Rom 8:26). All we know is that it is not this. Yet in not knowing, we know that this reality must exist. “There
is therefore in us a certain learned ignorance (docta ignorantia), so to speak”, he writes. We do not know what
we would really like; we do not know this “true life”; and yet we know that there must be something we do not
know towards which we feel driven.8
12. I think that in this very precise and permanently valid way, Augustine is describing man's essential situation, the
situation that gives rise to all his contradictions and hopes. In some way we want life itself, true life, untouched even
by death; yet at the same time we do not know the thing towards which we feel driven. We cannot stop reaching out for it,
and yet we know that all we can experience or accomplish is not what we yearn for. This unknown “thing” is the
true “hope” which drives us, and at the same time the fact that it is unknown is the cause of all forms of despair
and also of all efforts, whether positive or destructive, directed towards worldly authenticity and human authenticity. The
term “eternal life” is intended to give a name to this known “unknown”. Inevitably it is an inadequate
term that creates confusion. “Eternal”, in fact, suggests to us the idea of something interminable, and this frightens
us; “life” makes us think of the life that we know and love and do not want to lose, even though very often it
brings more toil than satisfaction, so that while on the one hand we desire it, on the other hand we do not want it. To imagine
ourselves outside the temporality that imprisons us and in some way to sense that eternity is not an unending succession of
days in the calendar, but something more like the supreme moment of satisfaction, in which totality embraces us and we embrace
totality—this we can only attempt. It would be like plunging into the ocean of infinite love, a moment in which time—the
before and after—no longer exists. We can only attempt to grasp the idea that such a moment is life in the full sense,
a plunging ever anew into the vastness of being, in which we are simply overwhelmed with joy. This is how Jesus expresses
it in Saint John's Gospel: “I will see you again and your hearts will rejoice, and no one will take your joy from you”
(16:22). We must think along these lines if we want to understand the object of Christian hope, to understand what it is that
our faith, our being with Christ, leads us to expect.9
Is Christian hope individualistic?
13. In the course of their history, Christians have tried to express this “knowing without knowing” by means
of figures that can be represented, and they have developed images of “Heaven” which remain far removed from what,
after all, can only be known negatively, via unknowing. All these attempts at the representation of hope have given to many
people, down the centuries, the incentive to live by faith and hence also to abandon their hyparchonta, the material
substance for their lives. The author of the Letter to the Hebrews, in the eleventh chapter, outlined a kind of history
of those who live in hope and of their journeying, a history which stretches from the time of Abel into the author's own day.
This type of hope has been subjected to an increasingly harsh critique in modern times: it is dismissed as pure individualism,
a way of abandoning the world to its misery and taking refuge in a private form of eternal salvation. Henri de Lubac, in the
introduction to his seminal book Catholicisme. Aspects sociaux du dogme, assembled some characteristic articulations
of this viewpoint, one of which is worth quoting: “Should I have found joy? No ... only my joy, and that is something
wildly different ... The joy of Jesus can be personal. It can belong to a single man and he is saved. He is at peace ... now
and always, but he is alone. The isolation of this joy does not trouble him. On the contrary: he is the chosen one! In his
blessedness he passes through the battlefields with a rose in his hand.” 10
14. Against this, drawing upon the vast range of patristic theology, de Lubac was able to demonstrate that salvation has
always been considered a “social” reality. Indeed, the Letter to the Hebrews speaks of a “city”
(cf. 11:10, 16; 12:22; 13:14) and therefore of communal salvation. Consistently with this view, sin is understood by the Fathers
as the destruction of the unity of the human race, as fragmentation and division. Babel, the place where languages were confused,
the place of separation, is seen to be an expression of what sin fundamentally is. Hence “redemption” appears
as the reestablishment of unity, in which we come together once more in a union that begins to take shape in the world community
of believers. We need not concern ourselves here with all the texts in which the social character of hope appears. Let us
concentrate on the Letter to Proba in which Augustine tries to illustrate to some degree this “known unknown”
that we seek. His point of departure is simply the expression “blessed life”. Then he quotes Psalm 144
[143]:15: “Blessed is the people whose God is the Lord.” And he continues: “In order to be numbered among
this people and attain to ... everlasting life with God, ‘the end of the commandment is charity that issues from a pure
heart and a good conscience and sincere faith' (1 Tim 1:5).” 11 This real life, towards which we try
to reach out again and again, is linked to a lived union with a “people”, and for each individual it can only
be attained within this “we”. It presupposes that we escape from the prison of our “I”, because only
in the openness of this universal subject does our gaze open out to the source of joy, to love itself—to God.
15. While this community-oriented vision of the “blessed life” is certainly directed beyond the present world,
as such it also has to do with the building up of this world—in very different ways, according to the historical context
and the possibilities offered or excluded thereby. At the time of Augustine, the incursions of new peoples were threatening
the cohesion of the world, where hitherto there had been a certain guarantee of law and of living in a juridically ordered
society; at that time, then, it was a matter of strengthening the basic foundations of this peaceful societal existence, in
order to survive in a changed world. Let us now consider a more or less randomly chosen episode from the Middle Ages, that
serves in many respects to illustrate what we have been saying. It was commonly thought that monasteries were places of flight
from the world (contemptus mundi) and of withdrawal from responsibility for the world, in search of private salvation.
Bernard of Clairvaux, who inspired a multitude of young people to enter the monasteries of his reformed Order, had quite a
different perspective on this. In his view, monks perform a task for the whole Church and hence also for the world. He uses
many images to illustrate the responsibility that monks have towards the entire body of the Church, and indeed towards humanity;
he applies to them the words of pseudo-Rufinus: “The human race lives thanks to a few; were it not for them, the world
would perish ...”.12 Contemplatives—contemplantes—must become agricultural labourers—laborantes—he
says. The nobility of work, which Christianity inherited from Judaism, had already been expressed in the monastic rules of
Augustine and Benedict. Bernard takes up this idea again. The young noblemen who flocked to his monasteries had to engage
in manual labour. In fact Bernard explicitly states that not even the monastery can restore Paradise, but he maintains that,
as a place of practical and spiritual “tilling the soil”, it must prepare the new Paradise. A wild plot of forest
land is rendered fertile—and in the process, the trees of pride are felled, whatever weeds may be growing inside souls
are pulled up, and the ground is thereby prepared so that bread for body and soul can flourish.13 Are we not perhaps
seeing once again, in the light of current history, that no positive world order can prosper where souls are overgrown?
The transformation of Christian faith-hope in the modern age
16. How could the idea have developed that Jesus's message is narrowly individualistic and aimed only at each person singly?
How did we arrive at this interpretation of the “salvation of the soul” as a flight from responsibility for the
whole, and how did we come to conceive the Christian project as a selfish search for salvation which rejects the idea of serving
others? In order to find an answer to this we must take a look at the foundations of the modern age. These appear with particular
clarity in the thought of Francis Bacon. That a new era emerged—through the discovery of America and the new technical
achievements that had made this development possible—is undeniable. But what is the basis of this new era? It is the
new correlation of experiment and method that enables man to arrive at an interpretation of nature in conformity with its
laws and thus finally to achieve “the triumph of art over nature” (victoria cursus artis super naturam).14
The novelty—according to Bacon's vision—lies in a new correlation between science and praxis. This is also given
a theological application: the new correlation between science and praxis would mean that the dominion over creation —given
to man by God and lost through original sin—would be reestablished.15
17. Anyone who reads and reflects on these statements attentively will recognize that a disturbing step has been taken:
up to that time, the recovery of what man had lost through the expulsion from Paradise was expected from faith in Jesus Christ:
herein lay “redemption”. Now, this “redemption”, the restoration of the lost “Paradise”
is no longer expected from faith, but from the newly discovered link between science and praxis. It is not that faith is simply
denied; rather it is displaced onto another level—that of purely private and other-worldly affairs—and at the
same time it becomes somehow irrelevant for the world. This programmatic vision has determined the trajectory of modern times
and it also shapes the present-day crisis of faith which is essentially a crisis of Christian hope. Thus hope too, in Bacon,
acquires a new form. Now it is called: faith in progress. For Bacon, it is clear that the recent spate of discoveries
and inventions is just the beginning; through the interplay of science and praxis, totally new discoveries will follow, a
totally new world will emerge, the kingdom of man.16 He even put forward a vision of foreseeable inventions—including
the aeroplane and the submarine. As the ideology of progress developed further, joy at visible advances in human potential
remained a continuing confirmation of faith in progress as such.
18. At the same time, two categories become increasingly central to the idea of progress: reason and freedom. Progress
is primarily associated with the growing dominion of reason, and this reason is obviously considered to be a force of good
and a force for good. Progress is the overcoming of all forms of dependency—it is progress towards perfect freedom.
Likewise freedom is seen purely as a promise, in which man becomes more and more fully himself. In both concepts—freedom
and reason—there is a political aspect. The kingdom of reason, in fact, is expected as the new condition of the human
race once it has attained total freedom. The political conditions of such a kingdom of reason and freedom, however, appear
at first sight somewhat ill defined. Reason and freedom seem to guarantee by themselves, by virtue of their intrinsic goodness,
a new and perfect human community. The two key concepts of “reason” and “freedom”, however, were tacitly
interpreted as being in conflict with the shackles of faith and of the Church as well as those of the political structures
of the period. Both concepts therefore contain a revolutionary potential of enormous explosive force.
19. We must look briefly at the two essential stages in the political realization of this hope, because they are of great
importance for the development of Christian hope, for a proper understanding of it and of the reasons for its persistence.
First there is the French Revolution—an attempt to establish the rule of reason and freedom as a political reality.
To begin with, the Europe of the Enlightenment looked on with fascination at these events, but then, as they developed, had
cause to reflect anew on reason and freedom. A good illustration of these two phases in the reception of events in France
is found in two essays by Immanuel Kant in which he reflects on what had taken place. In 1792 he wrote Der Sieg des guten
Prinzips über das böse und die Gründung eines Reiches Gottes auf Erden (“The Victory of the Good over the Evil Principle
and the Founding of a Kingdom of God on Earth”). In this text he says the following: “The gradual transition of
ecclesiastical faith to the exclusive sovereignty of pure religious faith is the coming of the Kingdom of God.” 17
He also tells us that revolutions can accelerate this transition from ecclesiastical faith to rational faith. The “Kingdom
of God” proclaimed by Jesus receives a new definition here and takes on a new mode of presence; a new “imminent
expectation”, so to speak, comes into existence: the “Kingdom of God” arrives where “ecclesiastical
faith” is vanquished and superseded by “religious faith”, that is to say, by simple rational faith. In 1795,
in the text Das Ende aller Dinge (“The End of All Things”) a changed image appears. Now Kant considers
the possibility that as well as the natural end of all things there may be another that is unnatural, a perverse end. He writes
in this connection: “If Christianity should one day cease to be worthy of love ... then the prevailing mode in human
thought would be rejection and opposition to it; and the Antichrist ... would begin his—albeit short—regime (presumably
based on fear and self-interest); but then, because Christianity, though destined to be the world religion, would not in fact
be favoured by destiny to become so, then, in a moral respect, this could lead to the (perverted) end of all things.”
18
20. The nineteenth century held fast to its faith in progress as the new form of human hope, and it continued to consider
reason and freedom as the guiding stars to be followed along the path of hope. Nevertheless, the increasingly rapid advance
of technical development and the industrialization connected with it soon gave rise to an entirely new social situation: there
emerged a class of industrial workers and the so-called “industrial proletariat”, whose dreadful living conditions
Friedrich Engels described alarmingly in 1845. For his readers, the conclusion is clear: this cannot continue; a change is
necessary. Yet the change would shake up and overturn the entire structure of bourgeois society. After the bourgeois revolution
of 1789, the time had come for a new, proletarian revolution: progress could not simply continue in small, linear steps. A
revolutionary leap was needed. Karl Marx took up the rallying call, and applied his incisive language and intellect to the
task of launching this major new and, as he thought, definitive step in history towards salvation—towards what Kant
had described as the “Kingdom of God”. Once the truth of the hereafter had been rejected, it would then be a question
of establishing the truth of the here and now. The critique of Heaven is transformed into the critique of earth, the critique
of theology into the critique of politics. Progress towards the better, towards the definitively good world, no longer comes
simply from science but from politics—from a scientifically conceived politics that recognizes the structure of history
and society and thus points out the road towards revolution, towards all-encompassing change. With great precision, albeit
with a certain onesided bias, Marx described the situation of his time, and with great analytical skill he spelled out the
paths leading to revolution—and not only theoretically: by means of the Communist Party that came into being from the
Communist Manifesto of 1848, he set it in motion. His promise, owing to the acuteness of his analysis and his clear indication
of the means for radical change, was and still remains an endless source of fascination. Real revolution followed, in the
most radical way in Russia.
21. Together with the victory of the revolution, though, Marx's fundamental error also became evident. He showed precisely
how to overthrow the existing order, but he did not say how matters should proceed thereafter. He simply presumed that with
the expropriation of the ruling class, with the fall of political power and the socialization of means of production, the
new Jerusalem would be realized. Then, indeed, all contradictions would be resolved, man and the world would finally sort
themselves out. Then everything would be able to proceed by itself along the right path, because everything would belong to
everyone and all would desire the best for one another. Thus, having accomplished the revolution, Lenin must have realized
that the writings of the master gave no indication as to how to proceed. True, Marx had spoken of the interim phase of the
dictatorship of the proletariat as a necessity which in time would automatically become redundant. This “intermediate
phase” we know all too well, and we also know how it then developed, not ushering in a perfect world, but leaving behind
a trail of appalling destruction. Marx not only omitted to work out how this new world would be organized—which should,
of course, have been unnecessary. His silence on this matter follows logically from his chosen approach. His error lay deeper.
He forgot that man always remains man. He forgot man and he forgot man's freedom. He forgot that freedom always remains also
freedom for evil. He thought that once the economy had been put right, everything would automatically be put right. His real
error is materialism: man, in fact, is not merely the product of economic conditions, and it is not possible to redeem him
purely from the outside by creating a favourable economic environment.
22. Again, we find ourselves facing the question: what may we hope? A self-critique of modernity is needed in dialogue
with Christianity and its concept of hope. In this dialogue Christians too, in the context of their knowledge and experience,
must learn anew in what their hope truly consists, what they have to offer to the world and what they cannot offer. Flowing
into this self-critique of the modern age there also has to be a self-critique of modern Christianity, which must constantly
renew its self-understanding setting out from its roots. On this subject, all we can attempt here are a few brief observations.
First we must ask ourselves: what does “progress” really mean; what does it promise and what does it not promise?
In the nineteenth century, faith in progress was already subject to critique. In the twentieth century, Theodor W. Adorno
formulated the problem of faith in progress quite drastically: he said that progress, seen accurately, is progress from the
sling to the atom bomb. Now this is certainly an aspect of progress that must not be concealed. To put it another way: the
ambiguity of progress becomes evident. Without doubt, it offers new possibilities for good, but it also opens up appalling
possibilities for evil—possibilities that formerly did not exist. We have all witnessed the way in which progress, in
the wrong hands, can become and has indeed become a terrifying progress in evil. If technical progress is not matched by corresponding
progress in man's ethical formation, in man's inner growth (cf. Eph 3:16; 2 Cor 4:16), then it is not progress
at all, but a threat for man and for the world.
23. As far as the two great themes of “reason” and “freedom” are concerned, here we can only touch
upon the issues connected with them. Yes indeed, reason is God's great gift to man, and the victory of reason over unreason
is also a goal of the Christian life. But when does reason truly triumph? When it is detached from God? When it has become
blind to God? Is the reason behind action and capacity for action the whole of reason? If progress, in order to be progress,
needs moral growth on the part of humanity, then the reason behind action and capacity for action is likewise urgently in
need of integration through reason's openness to the saving forces of faith, to the differentiation between good and evil.
Only thus does reason become truly human. It becomes human only if it is capable of directing the will along the right path,
and it is capable of this only if it looks beyond itself. Otherwise, man's situation, in view of the imbalance between his
material capacity and the lack of judgement in his heart, becomes a threat for him and for creation. Thus where freedom is
concerned, we must remember that human freedom always requires a convergence of various freedoms. Yet this convergence cannot
succeed unless it is determined by a common intrinsic criterion of measurement, which is the foundation and goal of our freedom.
Let us put it very simply: man needs God, otherwise he remains without hope. Given the developments of the modern age, the
quotation from Saint Paul with which I began (Eph 2:12) proves to be thoroughly realistic and plainly true. There is
no doubt, therefore, that a “Kingdom of God” accomplished without God—a kingdom therefore of man alone—inevitably
ends up as the “perverse end” of all things as described by Kant: we have seen it, and we see it over and over
again. Yet neither is there any doubt that God truly enters into human affairs only when, rather than being present merely
in our thinking, he himself comes towards us and speaks to us. Reason therefore needs faith if it is to be completely itself:
reason and faith need one another in order to fulfil their true nature and their mission.
The true shape of Christian hope
24. Let us ask once again: what may we hope? And what may we not hope? First of all, we must acknowledge that incremental
progress is possible only in the material sphere. Here, amid our growing knowledge of the structure of matter and in the light
of ever more advanced inventions, we clearly see continuous progress towards an ever greater mastery of nature. Yet in the
field of ethical awareness and moral decision-making, there is no similar possibility of accumulation for the simple reason
that man's freedom is always new and he must always make his decisions anew. These decisions can never simply be made for
us in advance by others—if that were the case, we would no longer be free. Freedom presupposes that in fundamental decisions,
every person and every generation is a new beginning. Naturally, new generations can build on the knowledge and experience
of those who went before, and they can draw upon the moral treasury of the whole of humanity. But they can also reject it,
because it can never be self-evident in the same way as material inventions. The moral treasury of humanity is not readily
at hand like tools that we use; it is present as an appeal to freedom and a possibility for it. This, however, means that:
a) The right state of human affairs, the moral well-being of the world can never be guaranteed simply through structures
alone, however good they are. Such structures are not only important, but necessary; yet they cannot and must not marginalize
human freedom. Even the best structures function only when the community is animated by convictions capable of motivating
people to assent freely to the social order. Freedom requires conviction; conviction does not exist on its own, but must always
be gained anew by the community.
b) Since man always remains free and since his freedom is always fragile, the kingdom of good will never be definitively
established in this world. Anyone who promises the better world that is guaranteed to last for ever is making a false promise;
he is overlooking human freedom. Freedom must constantly be won over for the cause of good. Free assent to the good never
exists simply by itself. If there were structures which could irrevocably guarantee a determined—good—state of
the world, man's freedom would be denied, and hence they would not be good structures at all.
25. What this means is that every generation has the task of engaging anew in the arduous search for the right way to order
human affairs; this task is never simply completed. Yet every generation must also make its own contribution to establishing
convincing structures of freedom and of good, which can help the following generation as a guideline for the proper use of
human freedom; hence, always within human limits, they provide a certain guarantee also for the future. In other words: good
structures help, but of themselves they are not enough. Man can never be redeemed simply from outside. Francis Bacon and those
who followed in the intellectual current of modernity that he inspired were wrong to believe that man would be redeemed through
science. Such an expectation asks too much of science; this kind of hope is deceptive. Science can contribute greatly to making
the world and mankind more human. Yet it can also destroy mankind and the world unless it is steered by forces that lie outside
it. On the other hand, we must also acknowledge that modern Christianity, faced with the successes of science in progressively
structuring the world, has to a large extent restricted its attention to the individual and his salvation. In so doing it
has limited the horizon of its hope and has failed to recognize sufficiently the greatness of its task—even if it has
continued to achieve great things in the formation of man and in care for the weak and the suffering.
26. It is not science that redeems man: man is redeemed by love. This applies even in terms of this present world. When
someone has the experience of a great love in his life, this is a moment of “redemption” which gives a new meaning
to his life. But soon he will also realize that the love bestowed upon him cannot by itself resolve the question of his life.
It is a love that remains fragile. It can be destroyed by death. The human being needs unconditional love. He needs the certainty
which makes him say: “neither death, nor life, nor angels, nor principalities, nor things present, nor things to come,
nor powers, nor height, nor depth, nor anything else in all creation, will be able to separate us from the love of God in
Christ Jesus our Lord” (Rom 8:38- 39). If this absolute love exists, with its absolute certainty, then—only
then—is man “redeemed”, whatever should happen to him in his particular circumstances. This is what it means
to say: Jesus Christ has “redeemed” us. Through him we have become certain of God, a God who is not a remote “first
cause” of the world, because his only-begotten Son has become man and of him everyone can say: “I live by faith
in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me” (Gal 2:20).
27. In this sense it is true that anyone who does not know God, even though he may entertain all kinds of hopes, is ultimately
without hope, without the great hope that sustains the whole of life (cf. Eph 2:12). Man's great, true hope which holds
firm in spite of all disappointments can only be God—God who has loved us and who continues to love us “to the
end,” until all “is accomplished” (cf. Jn 13:1 and 19:30). Whoever is moved by love begins to perceive
what “life” really is. He begins to perceive the meaning of the word of hope that we encountered in the Baptismal
Rite: from faith I await “eternal life”—the true life which, whole and unthreatened, in all its fullness,
is simply life. Jesus, who said that he had come so that we might have life and have it in its fullness, in abundance (cf.
Jn 10:10), has also explained to us what “life” means: “this is eternal life, that they know you the
only true God, and Jesus Christ whom you have sent” (Jn 17:3). Life in its true sense is not something we have
exclusively in or from ourselves: it is a relationship. And life in its totality is a relationship with him who is the source
of life. If we are in relation with him who does not die, who is Life itself and Love itself, then we are in life. Then we
“live”.
28. Yet now the question arises: are we not in this way falling back once again into an individualistic understanding of
salvation, into hope for myself alone, which is not true hope since it forgets and overlooks others? Indeed we are not! Our
relationship with God is established through communion with Jesus—we cannot achieve it alone or from our own resources
alone. The relationship with Jesus, however, is a relationship with the one who gave himself as a ransom for all (cf. 1
Tim 2:6). Being in communion with Jesus Christ draws us into his “being for all”; it makes it our own way
of being. He commits us to live for others, but only through communion with him does it become possible truly to be there
for others, for the whole. In this regard I would like to quote the great Greek Doctor of the Church, Maximus the Confessor
(† 662), who begins by exhorting us to prefer nothing to the knowledge and love of God, but then quickly moves on to
practicalities: “The one who loves God cannot hold on to money but rather gives it out in God's fashion ... in the same
manner in accordance with the measure of justice.” 19 Love of God leads to participation in the justice and
generosity of God towards others. Loving God requires an interior freedom from all possessions and all material goods: the
love of God is revealed in responsibility for others.20 This same connection between love of God and responsibility
for others can be seen in a striking way in the life of Saint Augustine. After his conversion to the Christian faith, he decided,
together with some like-minded friends, to lead a life totally dedicated to the word of God and to things eternal. His intention
was to practise a Christian version of the ideal of the contemplative life expressed in the great tradition of Greek philosophy,
choosing in this way the “better part” (cf. Lk 10:42). Things turned out differently, however. While
attending the Sunday liturgy at the port city of Hippo, he was called out from the assembly by the Bishop and constrained
to receive ordination for the exercise of the priestly ministry in that city. Looking back on that moment, he writes in his
Confessions: “Terrified by my sins and the weight of my misery, I had resolved in my heart, and meditated flight
into the wilderness; but you forbade me and gave me strength, by saying: ‘Christ died for all, that those who live might
live no longer for themselves but for him who for their sake died' (cf. 2 Cor 5:15)”.21 Christ died
for all. To live for him means allowing oneself to be drawn into his being for others.
29. For Augustine this meant a totally new life. He once described his daily life in the following terms: “The turbulent
have to be corrected, the faint-hearted cheered up, the weak supported; the Gospel's opponents need to be refuted, its insidious
enemies guarded against; the unlearned need to be taught, the indolent stirred up, the argumentative checked; the proud must
be put in their place, the desperate set on their feet, those engaged in quarrels reconciled; the needy have to be helped,
the oppressed to be liberated, the good to be encouraged, the bad to be tolerated; all must be loved.” 22
“The Gospel terrifies me” 23—producing that healthy fear which prevents us from living for ourselves
alone and compels us to pass on the hope we hold in common. Amid the serious difficulties facing the Roman Empire—and
also posing a serious threat to Roman Africa, which was actually destroyed at the end of Augustine's life—this was what
he set out to do: to transmit hope, the hope which came to him from faith and which, in complete contrast with his introverted
temperament, enabled him to take part decisively and with all his strength in the task of building up the city. In the same
chapter of the Confessions in which we have just noted the decisive reason for his commitment “for all”,
he says that Christ “intercedes for us, otherwise I should despair. My weaknesses are many and grave, many and grave
indeed, but more abundant still is your medicine. We might have thought that your word was far distant from union with man,
and so we might have despaired of ourselves, if this Word had not become flesh and dwelt among us.” 24 On
the strength of his hope, Augustine dedicated himself completely to the ordinary people and to his city—renouncing his
spiritual nobility, he preached and acted in a simple way for simple people.
30. Let us summarize what has emerged so far in the course of our reflections. Day by day, man experiences many greater
or lesser hopes, different in kind according to the different periods of his life. Sometimes one of these hopes may appear
to be totally satisfying without any need for other hopes. Young people can have the hope of a great and fully satisfying
love; the hope of a certain position in their profession, or of some success that will prove decisive for the rest of their
lives. When these hopes are fulfilled, however, it becomes clear that they were not, in reality, the whole. It becomes evident
that man has need of a hope that goes further. It becomes clear that only something infinite will suffice for him, something
that will always be more than he can ever attain. In this regard our contemporary age has developed the hope of creating a
perfect world that, thanks to scientific knowledge and to scientifically based politics, seemed to be achievable. Thus Biblical
hope in the Kingdom of God has been displaced by hope in the kingdom of man, the hope of a better world which would be the
real “Kingdom of God”. This seemed at last to be the great and realistic hope that man needs. It was capable of
galvanizing—for a time—all man's energies. The great objective seemed worthy of full commitment. In the course
of time, however, it has become clear that this hope is constantly receding. Above all it has become apparent that this may
be a hope for a future generation, but not for me.
And however much “for all” may be part of the great hope—since I cannot be happy without others or in
opposition to them—it remains true that a hope that does not concern me personally is not a real hope. It has also become
clear that this hope is opposed to freedom, since human affairs depend in each generation on the free decisions of those concerned.
If this freedom were to be taken away, as a result of certain conditions or structures, then ultimately this world would not
be good, since a world without freedom can by no means be a good world. Hence, while we must always be committed to the improvement
of the world, tomorrow's better world cannot be the proper and sufficient content of our hope. And in this regard the question
always arises: when is the world “better”? What makes it good? By what standard are we to judge its goodness?
What are the paths that lead to this “goodness”?
31. Let us say once again: we need the greater and lesser hopes that keep us going day by day. But these are not enough
without the great hope, which must surpass everything else. This great hope can only be God, who encompasses the whole of
reality and who can bestow upon us what we, by ourselves, cannot attain. The fact that it comes to us as a gift is actually
part of hope. God is the foundation of hope: not any god, but the God who has a human face and who has loved us to the end,
each one of us and humanity in its entirety. His Kingdom is not an imaginary hereafter, situated in a future that will never
arrive; his Kingdom is present wherever he is loved and wherever his love reaches us. His love alone gives us the possibility
of soberly persevering day by day, without ceasing to be spurred on by hope, in a world which by its very nature is imperfect.
His love is at the same time our guarantee of the existence of what we only vaguely sense and which nevertheless, in our deepest
self, we await: a life that is “truly” life. Let us now, in the final section, develop this idea in more detail
as we focus our attention on some of the “settings” in which we can learn in practice about hope and its exercise.
“Settings” for learning and practising hope
I. Prayer as a school of hope
32. A first essential setting for learning hope is prayer. When no one listens to me any more, God still listens to me.
When I can no longer talk to anyone or call upon anyone, I can always talk to God. When there is no longer anyone to help
me deal with a need or expectation that goes beyond the human capacity for hope, he can help me.25 When I have
been plunged into complete solitude ...; if I pray I am never totally alone. The late Cardinal Nguyen Van Thuan, a prisoner
for thirteen years, nine of them spent in solitary confinement, has left us a precious little book: Prayers of Hope.
During thirteen years in jail, in a situation of seemingly utter hopelessness, the fact that he could listen and speak to
God became for him an increasing power of hope, which enabled him, after his release, to become for people all over the world
a witness to hope—to that great hope which does not wane even in the nights of solitude.
33. Saint Augustine, in a homily on the First Letter of John, describes very beautifully the intimate relationship
between prayer and hope. He defines prayer as an exercise of desire. Man was created for greatness—for God himself;
he was created to be filled by God. But his heart is too small for the greatness to which it is destined. It must be stretched.
“By delaying [his gift], God strengthens our desire; through desire he enlarges our soul and by expanding it he increases
its capacity [for receiving him]”. Augustine refers to Saint Paul, who speaks of himself as straining forward to the
things that are to come (cf. Phil 3:13). He then uses a very beautiful image to describe this process of enlargement
and preparation of the human heart. “Suppose that God wishes to fill you with honey [a symbol of God's tenderness and
goodness]; but if you are full of vinegar, where will you put the honey?” The vessel, that is your heart, must first
be enlarged and then cleansed, freed from the vinegar and its taste. This requires hard work and is painful, but in this way
alone do we become suited to that for which we are destined.26 Even if Augustine speaks directly only of our capacity
for God, it is nevertheless clear that through this effort by which we are freed from vinegar and the taste of vinegar, not
only are we made free for God, but we also become open to others. It is only by becoming children of God, that we can be with
our common Father. To pray is not to step outside history and withdraw to our own private corner of happiness. When we pray
properly we undergo a process of inner purification which opens us up to God and thus to our fellow human beings as well.
In prayer we must learn what we can truly ask of God—what is worthy of God. We must learn that we cannot pray against
others. We must learn that we cannot ask for the superficial and comfortable things that we desire at this moment—that
meagre, misplaced hope that leads us away from God. We must learn to purify our desires and our hopes. We must free ourselves
from the hidden lies with which we deceive ourselves. God sees through them, and when we come before God, we too are forced
to recognize them. “But who can discern his errors? Clear me from hidden faults” prays the Psalmist (Ps 19:12
[18:13]). Failure to recognize my guilt, the illusion of my innocence, does not justify me and does not save me, because I
am culpable for the numbness of my conscience and my incapacity to recognize the evil in me for what it is. If God does not
exist, perhaps I have to seek refuge in these lies, because there is no one who can forgive me; no one who is the true criterion.
Yet my encounter with God awakens my conscience in such a way that it no longer aims at self-justification, and is no longer
a mere reflection of me and those of my contemporaries who shape my thinking, but it becomes a capacity for listening to the
Good itself.
34. For prayer to develop this power of purification, it must on the one hand be something very personal, an encounter
between my intimate self and God, the living God. On the other hand it must be constantly guided and enlightened by the great
prayers of the Church and of the saints, by liturgical prayer, in which the Lord teaches us again and again how to pray properly.
Cardinal Nguyen Van Thuan, in his book of spiritual exercises, tells us that during his life there were long periods when
he was unable to pray and that he would hold fast to the texts of the Church's prayer: the Our Father, the Hail Mary and the
prayers of the liturgy.27 Praying must always involve this intermingling of public and personal prayer. This is
how we can speak to God and how God speaks to us. In this way we undergo those purifications by which we become open to God
and are prepared for the service of our fellow human beings. We become capable of the great hope, and thus we become ministers
of hope for others. Hope in a Christian sense is always hope for others as well. It is an active hope, in which we struggle
to prevent things moving towards the “perverse end”. It is an active hope also in the sense that we keep the world
open to God. Only in this way does it continue to be a truly human hope.
II. Action and suffering as settings for learning hope
35. All serious and upright human conduct is hope in action. This is so first of all in the sense that we thereby strive
to realize our lesser and greater hopes, to complete this or that task which is important for our onward journey, or we work
towards a brighter and more humane world so as to open doors into the future. Yet our daily efforts in pursuing our own lives
and in working for the world's future either tire us or turn into fanaticism, unless we are enlightened by the radiance of
the great hope that cannot be destroyed even by small-scale failures or by a breakdown in matters of historic importance.
If we cannot hope for more than is effectively attainable at any given time, or more than is promised by political or economic
authorities, our lives will soon be without hope. It is important to know that I can always continue to hope, even if in my
own life, or the historical period in which I am living, there seems to be nothing left to hope for. Only the great certitude
of hope that my own life and history in general, despite all failures, are held firm by the indestructible power of Love,
and that this gives them their meaning and importance, only this kind of hope can then give the courage to act and to persevere.
Certainly we cannot “build” the Kingdom of God by our own efforts—what we build will always be the kingdom
of man with all the limitations proper to our human nature. The Kingdom of God is a gift, and precisely because of this, it
is great and beautiful, and constitutes the response to our hope. And we cannot—to use the classical expression—”merit”
Heaven through our works. Heaven is always more than we could merit, just as being loved is never something “merited”,
but always a gift. However, even when we are fully aware that Heaven far exceeds what we can merit, it will always be true
that our behaviour is not indifferent before God and therefore is not indifferent for the unfolding of history. We can open
ourselves and the world and allow God to enter: we can open ourselves to truth, to love, to what is good. This is what the
saints did, those who, as “God's fellow workers”, contributed to the world's salvation (cf. 1 Cor 3:9;
1 Th 3:2). We can free our life and the world from the poisons and contaminations that could destroy the present and
the future. We can uncover the sources of creation and keep them unsullied, and in this way we can make a right use of creation,
which comes to us as a gift, according to its intrinsic requirements and ultimate purpose. This makes sense even if outwardly
we achieve nothing or seem powerless in the face of overwhelming hostile forces. So on the one hand, our actions engender
hope for us and for others; but at the same time, it is the great hope based upon God's promises that gives us courage and
directs our action in good times and bad.
36. Like action, suffering is a part of our human existence. Suffering stems partly from our finitude, and partly from
the mass of sin which has accumulated over the course of history, and continues to grow unabated today. Certainly we must
do whatever we can to reduce suffering: to avoid as far as possible the suffering of the innocent; to soothe pain; to give
assistance in overcoming mental su
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