Cardinal Koch: Danger of people amusing themselves to death

Swiss Curia Cardinal Kurt Koch has warned against neglecting belief in the resurrection. There is a danger "that we will only console ourselves with this world," said the President of the Pontifical Council for Promoting Christian Unity, according to the Diocese on Sunday in Eichstätt.

"For when we are not given a glimpse of eternal life and heaven is therefore closed to us, we are tempted and striving to seek and find heaven as it were on earth."

"Therefore, there is a great danger that people will enjoy themselves to death, work to death and even love to death."

This search takes place above all in pleasure, in work and in love. "Therefore, there is a great danger that people will enjoy themselves to death, work to death and even love to death, as prominent experts in modern life diagnose."

Eternal life liberating hope

In contrast, the prospect of eternal life in the future proves to be a liberating hope that is already having an effect in the present life.

Anyone who lives in this hope and thus has a great future ahead of them can live confidently in the present and pursue their mission with serene patience.

Willibald Week in Eichstätt

The cardinal spoke at the Willibald Week the diocesan festival week of the Diocese of Eichstätt in honor of the diocesan patron Willibald. The canonized missionary from southern England worked in the area of today's diocese of Eichstätt from 740 and probably died on July 7, 787.

Koch said of Willibald: "Because he was moved by the hope of eternal life with God, he was neither afraid nor shy to bear witness to this hope with his life and to proclaim the good news of the gospel."

Liberating Hope for Christians

Christians could live in a liberating hope. “The decisive characteristic of the Christian consists in the fact that God has promised him a future and that the present can be lived because he experiences the future as a positive reality.”

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