Restoring the Sacred

Sunday, November 24, 2013

Words of Relevance: Gerhart Niemeyer on "Hope"


Gerhart Niemeyer (with his friend William F. Buckley, Jr.), was one of the greatest minds of our time, as attested by some of the other great minds of our time.  Dr. Christopher Manion mentioned him today in a post at The Bellarmine Forum, entitled: "Hope in the Rearview Mirror."

One of those other great minds of our time, Angelo Codevilla, wrote a tribute to his former teacher on The University Bookman after Niemeyer died, in which he said the following: "Niemeyer’s life embodied the Platonic lesson he passed on to us—that to grow in understanding is to grow closer to God."  

There are too many relevant quotes of Niemeyer provided by Dr. Manion in his referenced post to choose just one, so herewith more than one:
"...not only Communists but all other varieties of progressive have raised hope as the flag around which their supporters rally.”
“Christian hope is for things imperishable, not confined to this world – things promised by God and secured by Jesus Christ. With a view to this imperishable glory, the entire Christian life is illumined and transfigured by hope. Hope thus is an enduring quality of a Christian life, together with faith and charity.”  

But the true believers on the Left:
"have drawn their secular hopes not from Christian sources but from futuristic ideologies."