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81 " The crucial question, therefore, is not how to accomplish the final reconciliation. That messianic problem ought not to be taken out of God's hands. The only thing worse than the failure of some modern grand narratives of emancipation would have been their success! Merely by trying to accomplish the messianic task, the have already done too much of the work of the antichrist. In demasking anti-messianic projects that offer universal salvation, Lyotard helps us ask the right kind of question, which is not how to achieve the final reconciliation, but what resources we need to live in peace in the absence of the final reconciliation. "
― Miroslav Volf , Exclusion & Embrace: A Theological Exploration of Identity, Otherness, and Reconciliation
82 " Contrary to the assumptions of Western moral traditions, human beings are (1) not free in their actions but governed by necessity; (2) not transparent to themselves and others in their motivations, but opaque; (3) not similar to each other and therefore subject to the same moral code, but each different. "
― Miroslav Volf , A Public Faith: How Followers of Christ Should Serve the Common Good
83 " To remember a wrongdoing is to struggle against it. "
― Miroslav Volf , The End of Memory: Remembering Rightly in a Violent World
84 " Virtuous theologians work as God’s stewards building God’s home (1 Cor. 3:9), not masters building their own little empires. "
― Miroslav Volf , For the Life of the World: Theology That Makes a Difference
85 " Karl Barth imagined the Christian theologian in the role of John the Baptist in the painting of Matthias Grünewald: he is standing to the side of the cross, holding the open Hebrew Scriptures in one hand and pointing with a finger of the other to the crucified Christ.67 A theologian ought to draw attention to the way of life and to the one who originally embodied it, not to the intellectual prowess, fertile imagination, or dazzling rhetoric of the theologian. "
86 " Second, as Luther stated, because God’s love isn’t caused by its object, it can love those who are not lovable, “sinners, evil persons, fools, and weaklings in order to make them righteous, good, wise, and strong”. Luther concluded, “rather than seeking its own good, the love of God flows forth and bestows good”. "
― Miroslav Volf , Free of Charge: Giving and Forgiving in a Culture Stripped of Grace