Samira Izadi Page
September 5, 2025
The Living Church Foundation
The very air seems thick with sorrow. Listening to the news, witnessing loved ones suffer from illness, or navigating the fragile terrain of immigration and uncertain futures—we encounter pain, disorientation, and a haunting sense of absurdity. Some stand nearer to these wounds, and at times it feels as though our world is poisoned by despair.
We wage wars of words, quick to defend our political convictions, even as sorrow and fury settle quietly into the soul. Yet Scripture urges us to read the signs of the times and pursue a heart of wisdom. Easy answers and polished platitudes may sound convincing, but they echo hollow in the face of real suffering—suffering borne by those we know, love, and serve. They cannot hold the weight of what is truly at stake. They fracture under the pressure of reality.
Searching for meaningful ways to offer hope—to refugees and immigrants and those disheartened by a dominating sense of fear—I have found resonant echoes in Augustine and Calvin. Their insights into the human condition are sobering and true, yet they leave me longing for a hope that speaks not only to eternity, but to this moment in time. Perhaps it is time to turn our gaze eastward, toward the deep wells of Orthodoxy, in which wisdom is forged in silence and suffering, beauty and endurance walk hand in hand, and hope is not shouted from pulpits but carried tenderly in the lives of saints.
St. Maximus the Confessor’s Four Hundred Chapters on Love can be a faithful companion, and his emphasis on beauty and love, alongside the Philokalia’s tradition of watchfulness (nepsis), offers balm to weary hearts. In recent time, one of the most illuminating resources, in my estimation, is Remembering the Future: Toward an Eschatological Ontology, the final monograph by Metropolitan John Zizioulas. His writings are marked by theological depth and mystical reverence, yet they remain profoundly applicable—shedding light on the future with clarity.
Zizioulas rightly observes that we lack a robust understanding of eschatology. While some end-times preachers proclaim doom and despair, many in mainline Protestant traditions avoid eschatology altogether. Zizioulas presents an eschatological ontology rooted in Eastern theology—profoundly biblical, richly textured, and radiant with hope.
In contrast to the Western conception of time—derived from Aristotle’s definition as “the number of movements in respect of before and after,” which leaves the present moment hollow—Zizioulas sees time transfigured by the resurrection. In Christ, the eschaton fills the now. History’s direction is reversed. The future is not merely ahead; it is breaking into the present. Resurrection time is the future pressing into the present, forming a new reality for those attuned to the kingdom through the Spirit’s power.
If we are to hold onto any real hope, we must interpret the events of our time through the lens of the resurrection. Hope is not merely the result of advocacy, equity, or service to the poor and marginalized—worthy as these are—but arises only when such actions are rooted in and illuminated by the power of the resurrection breaking into the present. True hope is not abstract or ideological; it is incarnational. It can only be offered when we share in the life of Christ—the living source of our hope—made manifest in concrete, embodied ways.
Resurrection time means the kingdom work of Christ gives life and sanctifies—and sanctification, at times, comes through the purifying fire. The universal hermeneutic of Romans 5:12, most closely associated with St. John of Damascus and echoed by other Eastern Fathers, may help us discern our moment: “Death passed upon all men, because of which all have sinned.” In this view, death precedes sin; mortality shapes our choices. Death, woundedness, and sin are shared threads in the human story. Christ’s resurrection, then, offers not merely forgiveness—it is healing, restoration, and the triumph over death.
This notion of shared consequence and communal vulnerability finds a powerful echo in Jewish thought. The Talmudic teaching in Sanhedrin 37a affirms: “Whoever destroys a single life is considered to have destroyed an entire world; and whoever saves a single life is considered to have saved an entire world.” Here, suffering and moral responsibility are not isolated—they are shared. The communal nature of sin and redemption is central to both traditions.
Can we, then, interpret our present moment as a painful yet shared sanctification? This is a time in which death and suffering are real, but through them, the Spirit refines, redeems, and draws us toward resurrection life.
Are immorality and evil in the world simply what they appear to be—unredeemed and unyielding? Or is it possible that both are true: that while evil unfolds—grievous and undeniable—God continues his quiet work of sanctification within and around it? Evil is not of God, nor does he will it. Yet even in its midst, the Spirit moves, drawing us toward holiness.
How do we speak of hope, sanctification, and holiness to a persecuted Christian family whose asylum has been denied, and who now face a future with no place to go? How do we explain why this is happening to them? How do we become the presence of Christ to them—not in theory, but in flesh and spirit?
These are not questions that yield to easy answers. They call for deep discernment, sacred listening, and the courage to stand in the tension between suffering and redemption—through faithful action. It is in this space that the Church must learn to embody hope—not as sentiment or slogan, but as sacrament.
The aim of engaging in deep discernment is not the advancement of theology in abstraction, but the offering of hope to those who suffer. Only in humility can this work be done—for to presume full knowledge of God’s mind is to forget the mystery we serve. Rowan Williams, in his introduction to Looking East in Winter, helpfully reminds us that only the angels perceive how all things work toward God’s purposes in their fullness. It is only through watchfulness and awareness that our perception deepens—though always, as Paul reminds us, “through a glass, darkly” (1 Cor. 13:12).
Perhaps it is mercy that we cannot fully perceive. The magnitude of God’s work might overwhelm us.
Even in partial vision, because of the resurrection, we are invited to live in trust and watchfulness. But there is more. Christ was not only raised—he appeared to his disciples in the flesh, collapsing the distance between now and the end of time. In his resurrection, the future broke into the present.
This reversal reshapes everything. Time no longer flows merely from past to future; it flows from the future into what theologians call the eternal now. The present is sanctified—infused with what will one day be fully revealed.
And so the Church is an eschatological community: a people who embody resurrection in the midst of death and darkness, bearing witness to the kingdom that is already among us, yet still coming. The Eucharist is our embodied celebration of this truth—enacted and encountered anew each Sunday. From this sacred center, the congregation is sent forth in the power of the Holy Spirit, bearing the truth into the world, expanding the eschatological horizon by proclaiming the gospel and participating in the work of Christ.
A note of caution is needed.
Our declarations of love for “all people” can become abstract, impersonal, even performative—falling short of true service to those we claim to love. Similarly, our proclamation of the gospel may be reduced to a distant concept: a future salvation detached from embodied reality. These distortions are often rooted in a misunderstanding of Christian time.
If the resurrection is real, and we are indeed an eschatological community, then our witness must be marked by palpable expressions of healing, reconciliation, and restoration in this present world—until Christ comes again. God’s love is always specific—manifested in sacrifice, service, and touching those deemed unloved or irredeemable: strangers, exiles, and the oppressed.
We may not fully understand the ways of God, and much remains hidden from our sight. Yet because of the resurrection, we are not left without hope. In Christ, the future has broken into the present, sanctifying time and transforming sorrow. This is not abstract theology—it is a living truth that enables us to offer real hope to those who suffer, by being present to them in love.
Eschatology is not merely speculation about the end—it is the confident hope that God will renew heaven and earth, reconciling all things to himself in Christ. And because of the resurrection, that future reality is already manifesting—though in smaller scale—through the Church as an eschatological community. Perhaps in this moment we are best invited to discern the signs of the times not with platitudes, but with watchfulness, humility, and love. Such discernment is essential if the church is to respond in ways that are specific and appropriate to the issues at hand—generalizations will not suffice. The suffering around us demands a theology that listens, adapts, and acts with precision and compassion.
We cannot be a people of hope if we do not take eschatology seriously. Because the resurrection is real, our present is charged with promise, and our calling is clear: to be agents of hope in a world aching for redemption.
In the introduction to Looking East in Winter, Archbishop Williams quotes the great fifth-century writer Diadochos of Photiki: “Looking east in winter, we feel the warmth of the sun on our faces while still sensing an icy chill at our backs.” We do not possess all the answers, nor do we hold every solution. The effects of evil and suffering remain real—we still feel their chill.
Yet we are not looking back. We turn our faces toward the light, for the Sun of Righteousness has risen. And by the power of his resurrection, we share in his life—as a community called to discern, together, spreading the light of hope into the shadows around us.
