The hope that God will restore all things is not a modern invention. It was a mainstream position in the early church, held by some of the greatest theologians Christianity has ever produced — including Origen, Gregory of Nyssa, and Clement of Alexandria. Of the six major theological schools in the ancient world, four taught universal reconciliation. The only school that taught eternal torment was the one whose teachers couldn't read the New Testament in Greek.
The essays below trace this history: from the patristic evidence for early church universalism to the political forces that suppressed it at the Fifth Ecumenical Council in 553 AD. The story of how this hope was lost — and why it is being rediscovered — is far more complicated than most Christians have been told.