About the Eshatology, History and the Mission of the Church in an Ecclesiastical Context

Authors:

Pages: 131-154
DOI: https://doi.org/10.54664/PDYT7665

Abstract:

Christian harmonizing of time with eternity takes place in the Liturgy. It is in and through Liturgy that the blessed harmony of history and eshatology ‘occurs and is preserved. For an Orthodox Christian, Liturgy is understood as sacrament of the blessed remembrance of God’s Domostroi and as an act of pre-tasting of the Kingdom of Heaven. Orthodox ecclesiology identifies eschatological and historical viewpoints as inseparable. Their unity is derived from the unity of christology and pneumatology. The Church is able to remember in the light of the eschaton, and the eschaton penetrates the realm of history. The disharmonising of the historical-eschatological accord between beneficial recollection and beneficial pre-tasting can have a negative impact on a number of different areas in a person’s life, or on theology and the Church. The mission of the Orthodox Church springs out from the depths of the evangelical-liturgical life of the Christians. It is a testimony of the pre-tasting of the Kingdom of God that has already arrived, yet not in its complete form. Its foundations are beneficial and Godmanlike, and its perspectives are simultaneously historical and eschatological. In every aspect of its life the Church thoroughly preserves and develops the awareness of its eschatological responsibility for man and the world.

Keywords:

history, eschatology, ecclesiology, mission, christology, pneumatology.

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