"Hope, insofar as it is hope of resurrection, is the living contradiction of what it proceeds from and what is placed under the sign of the Cross and death"

Hope, as Paul Ricoeur reflects, is rooted in paradox. It is not simply an optimistic feeling about the future, but is tied most profoundly to the promise of resurrection, a reality that emerges in the shadow of death and within the symbolism of the Cross. In Christian tradition, the Cross is the ultimate emblem of suffering, despair, and the apparent end of possibility. Death, particularly as symbolized in the crucifixion, represents negation, finality, and the cessation of life’s potential and meaning. Yet, within this very context, hope arises not in spite of death, but because it is contrasted with it.

Ricoeur’s point is to bring out hope’s intrinsic quality as a contradiction, a living contradiction. Resurrection is not merely a return to life but an entirely new mode of existence, which is only meaningful against the backdrop of death’s absolute negation. What makes hope powerful and transformative is not an escape from darkness, but a steadfastness that remains even when death and loss seem most totalizing. Hope, “insofar as it is hope of resurrection,” confronts death head-on and refuses to be defined by it. Rather than denying suffering or seeking to bypass it, hope holds open the possibility of a future that reality, as it stands, renders impossible.

Therein, hope is not naïve or passive; it is subversive because it dares to expect life in the face of death. It refuses to let suffering or mortality have the final word. Hope arises as “contradiction” because it is born precisely where all signs and predictions would point toward an end. Under the sign of the Cross, which gathers up every experience of loss and absence, hope stakes its claim for resurrection, a newness that, by all accounts, should not be. It thus becomes a living protest against the finality of despair and the silence of the grave, embodying the tension of living amidst suffering with the conviction of a future that alters the present.