The Meaning of Being Human

By: John D. Zizioulas, Metropolitan of Pergamon

In this book, Metropolitan of Pergamon is dealing with the most contemporary, the most urgent, the most existential issues facing the Church today. The core of the author’s argument is that personhood as an ecstatic and hypostatic mode of existence is not subject to any predetermination or necessity. The book provides a perfect opportunity to look retrospectively at Metropolitan John Zizioulas’ profound theological vision. It serves both as a significant illustration of his vitality in preserving the continuance of his thought, and of his enduring faithfulness to the constants which permeate his entire theological legacy. The restoration of personhood in Christ leads inevitably to the community of the Church which, in its turn, offers impersonal nature the possibility of being “referred” to God in its integrity through the personhood of man. This makes the Church eucharistic in its very nature, and man God by participation in God. The Church’s eucharistic identity has led Zizioulas to rethink theology as a whole on the basis of ecclesial experience as a reflection of Trinitarian life.