On 16 January, 2022: this post resulted in this project here:
Public Letter of Appreciation to Dr. Ilaria Ramelli
The development of this project benefitted from this input by Al Kimel:
Jesse, as far as I know Ilaria is not working on any more books on universalism. She suffers from progressive scoliosis and immune deficiencies that compromise her physical strength and ability to stand, walk, even sit, or combat infection. …Ilaria’s scholarly work continues. I just saw that she has recently written an essay on the patristic sources of Eriugena’s protology and eschatology. I would love to obtain a copy of it.
This is a draft concept to share for feedback before implementation. Separately, I am seeking some partners in this endeavor to collect signatures of appreciation and encouragement leading up to a meaningful date. If you have feedback or ideas regarding this very rough draft of a letter and concept, please comment below. More to follow soon, I hope…
[Significant Date Here]
Dear Dr. Ilaria Ramelli,
We the undersigned have each been reached and blessed in a meaningful way by your scholarly labors. We have read your books, listened to some of your lectures online or read and benefited from the many who cite your work in their own labors.
Not all of us are necessarily Christians, but we all are blessed by your public offerings. Naturally, the majority of us will share your love for the traditions and teachers of the Christian church over the years of her history. What all of us clearly share, however, is a love and appreciation for your ongoing study, particularly how the doctrine of apokatastasis went from a central tenet in the gospel message to being condemned and largely ignored for millennia.
We write in the solidarity of thankfulness for your skilled and generous labors. Those of us who pray, join with you in this way as well. May God sustain you in your work to complete the projects that you have underway.
We appreciate you and all that you have done in service of the history of the Christian faith.
Sincerely,
A total number here of all those who have signed this over the past … days…
Note this quote from her preface in A Larger Hope regarding her ongoing work:
It (the Christian Doctrine of Apokatastasis) will be followed in due course, God willing, by two other scholarly monographs: one on non-Christian and pre-Christian philosophical concepts of apokatastasis, from ancient philosophy to late antique Platonism (Proclus, Damascius), and another on the political, theological, pastoral, ecclesiastical, social, historical, and even linguistic causes for the rejection of the doctrine of apokatastasis or universal restoration, in late antiquity, by the “Church of the Empire”—mainly under the influence of Justinian in the East and of Augustine in the West.
A Larger Hope?, Volume 1: Universal Salvation from Christian Beginnings to Julian of Norwich by Ilaria L. E. Ramelli
Copious Flowers 