Hope, not optimism

Hope or Optimism

Hope is not merely the optimistic view that somehow everything will turn out all right in the end if everyone just does as we do. Hope is the more rugged, the more muscular view that even if things don’t turn out all right and aren’t all right, we endure through and beyond the times that disappoint or threaten to destroy us.

Peter Gomes
Source: The Scandalous Gospel of Jesus

Horror and Hope

Hope in the Depths

If you find hope in the ground of history, you are united with the great prophets who were able to look into the depth of their times, who tried to escape it, because they could not stand the horror of their visions, and who yet had the strength to look to an even deeper level and there to discover hope.

Paul Tillich
Source: The Shaking of the Foundations