El mal en la escatología de Juan Luis Ruiz de la Peña

Abstract

The Catechism of the Catholic Church indicates that «There is not a single aspect of the Christian message that is not in part an answer to the question of evil.» If it is true that the whole of the Christian faith constitutes the answer to the question of evil, then we cannot abstain from the reflection carried out from eschatology. For, in principle, the theme par excellence in the face of evil is hope, a hope that is forged from the event of the incarnation to the resurrection of Jesus Christ. Jesus himself does not leave humanity without hope, since he promises eternal life, a life in communion with God. The life of the human being is not diluted in death, but Jesus opens the doors so that the future of man has meaning. Therefore, in this article we approach the topic of evil from the eschatological viewpoint, considering that, for Ruiz de la Peña, eschatology does not contain any futurology, and it is not just one more futurology, among others. Further, he argues that it is incumbent on futurologies to adjust their accounts to mobile, immanent, intrahistoric futures. On the other hand, «eschatology points to the absolute, transcendent future, which overlaps history from the outside, and therefore transforms itself definitively into the meta-history.»