Talk:Apocatastasis

FrJohn says: Citations would be helpful!

Some fixes

I changed the definition to actually reflect what apokatastais is, in that the previous definition tried to define it indirectly by referring to hell (which is NOT defined in Holy Scripture) and misleadingly associating it with the Roman doctrine of purgatory. A good deal more needs to be done to this piece -- beyond all the misspellings, I think there are factual errors concerning St Gregory of Nyssa, etc. --Fr Lev 11:41, September 17, 2006 (CDT)

Kallistos Ware

I have deleted Bishop Ware from the list of modern advocates of this doctrine (albeit the intro did say "qualified" advocates). I think it's fairly clearly from his The Orthodox Church that he unequivocally rejects the salvation of all. See this online excerpt (look for the section titled "The Last Things" under the larger "Church of God" section): [1]. If anyone can find another place that he does seemingly argue for apocatastasis, post it here. Gabriela 23:24, September 17, 2006 (CDT)

Metropolitan Kalistos does not 'unequivocally reject' the salvation of all. This is what is quite obvious from his The Orthodox Church as well as from the final chapter of his vol. 1 of the collected works The Inner Kingdom "Dare we hope for the salvation of all". Metropolitan Kalistos answers the question with a very clear "yes" we may hope and must pray so:

"Hell exists as a possibility because free will exists. Yet, trusting in the inexhaustible attractiveness of God's love, we venture to express the hope - it is no more than a hope - that in the end, like Walter de la Mare's Traveler, we shall find that there is nobody there. Let us have the last word, then, with St. Silouan of Mount Athos: "Love could not bear that... We must pray for all (SVS Press, Crestwood NY, 2004, p. 215))."

Gregorios 22:59 (EST) August 25, 2007.

Hmm... I suppose he could be considered as an advocate of it to a limited qualified degree. But even from Gregorios' above quote, it seems that he advocates praying for the salvation of all not because hell is not a reality, but because to do otherwise would be condemnatory and ultimately anti-Christian. The phrase "it is no more than a hope" is a pretty definite statement. To say that something is no more than a dream or a hope only confirms its nonexistence—it is a dream, not a fact. For example, we can (and probably should) pray for everyone to find the True Faith, but we would be doing so because we knew that the opposite was the current state of the world. Gabriela 20:29, August 25, 2007 (PDT)

Distinctions

We really need to distinguish between those who hold a view identical to Origen's and those who more closely follow von Balthasar (Bp. Kallistos, etc.). Additionally, related articles on the salvation of those outside the Church may certainly be in order. Especially because the charge of heresy is such a serious one, we must be careful here to really establish what individual Orthodox writers have said, and provide citations. People have been falling on and off the list for awhile. I don't think a mere list is really sufficient here or does anyone much good without more detail and references. — FrJohn (talk)