Hope is the very heart and center of a human being. There is simply nothing more central to human life. But, strangely, we human beings who need hope more than anything else in life have written so little about it. In a good deal of Christian theology, hope seems to be something like a proverbial "middle child," sandwiched in between affirmations about the priority of faith and the excellence of love.

Michael Downey, Hope Begins Where Hope Begins