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2020 Florovsky Lecture Preview

Totus Christus: The Hope of the World

by Erin Doom

Feast of St Justin the Philosopher and Martyr and His Companions

Anno Domini 2020, June 1

In the 1954-55 Fall/Winter issue of St. Vladimir's Seminary Quarterly (founded by Fr. Georges Florovsky), Florovsky penned an editorial titled "Christ, The Hope of the World." For the third annual Florovsky Lecture, I'll be using five quotes from that editorial as a guide for the lecture on "Totus Christus: The Hope of the World." I'll conclude with a strong admonition Florovsky gave in a 1951 essay published in The Christian Century titled "The Lost Scriptural Mind." As a preview of the lecture, here are those six Florovsky quotes:

History: “There is a divine pattern of human history. It is much more than an abstract scheme or just a plan. God is taking part in the making of history, from day to day, even if man cannot always discern clearly the ways of God in that making. … there is an element of confident expectation implied in the Christian faith. It is here that the hope of Christians is ultimately rooted.”

Christ: “Christian hope is grounded in the belief that God takes interest in human life and in human history. … ‘God so loved the world as to give His only begotten Son. … It is only in Christ and through Him that we have any title for hope. Nothing can be done or achieved without Christ, or except in His name and by His power.”

Church: “Christ is still, and forever, with men in the Church, because ‘the Church is His Body,’ to use the glorious phrase of St. Paul. The Church is … precisely the Body of Christ, the place in which He is ever present and is continuing His ‘ministry of reconciliation.’ Man is not alone.”

Call to Action: “Christian hope is intrinsically a call to action. It is precisely because the Son of God was made man, to accomplish the will of the Father, that man should become the Son of God and to behave as a son, and not as a hireling, i.e. to do the will of the Heavenly Father.”

Conclusion: “What would I preach to my contemporaries ‘in a time such as this’? There is no room for hesitation: I am going to preach Jesus, and him crucified and risen. I am going to preach and to commend to all whom I may be called to address the message of salvation, as it has been handed down to me by an uninterrupted tradition of the Church Universal. In other words, I am going to preach the ‘doctrines of the creed.’”

Receive a video of the 2020 Florovsky Lecture in your inbox on Wednesday, June 3, A.D. 2020, by donating $25 or more to our spring campaign here.

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