Christian Quotes - Page 258

Two things have been bothering me for a long time. The first is the tendency of people in general - and that includes Christians - to "relativize" religion. Any religious belief is only "true for," so to speak - true for you or true for me or true for those people on the other side of the world. Second, I've been bothered by how poorly believers understand their own Story. They have bits and pieces, of course, but they're missing enough that they can easily become prey to ideas that sound spiritual, but end up being foolishness in the end.

I represent the jolly mass of mankind. I am the happy and reckless Christian.

I don't want to write a mass before being in a state to do it well, that is a Christian. I have therefore taken a singular course to reconcile my ideas with the exigencies of Academy rules. They ask me for something religious: very well, I shall do something religious, but of the pagan religion. . . . I have always read the ancient pagans with infinite pleasure, while in Christian writers I find only system, egoism, intolerance, and a complete lack of artistic taste.

If they are good workmen, they may be from Asia, Africa or Europe; they may be Mahometans, Jews or Christians of any sect, or they may be Atheists.

Being no bigot myself, I am disposed to indulge the professors of Christianity in the church that road to heaven which to them shall seem the most direct, plainest, easiest and least liable to exception.

No people can be bound to acknowledge the invisible hand which conducts the affairs of men more than the people of the united States. Every step by which they have advanced to the character of an independent nation seems to have been distinguished by some token of providential agency

God is playing a role in all religions and that Christians are more united than they sometimes think.

A perfect faith would lift us absolutely above fear

I firmly believe people have hitherto been a great deal too much taken up about doctrine and far too little about practice. The word "doctrine," as used in the Bible, means teaching of duty, not theory.

The kingdom of heaven is not come even when God's will is our law; it is fully come when God's will is our will.

If we knew as much about heaven as God does, we would clap our hands every time a Christian dies.

The leap of faith is a strategic impasse that confronts every Christian in search of converts; and, as he sees the matter, there is no wrong way to become a Christian. It is the end that is importnat, not the means; it does not matter why you believe, so long as you believe. For the philosopher, in contrast, the paramount issue is the justification of belief, not the fact of belief itself.

Christians worship a dead Jew on a stick

The Muslims observe their Sabbath on Friday, the Jews observe on Saturday, and the Christians on Sunday. By the time Monday rolls around God is completely f***in' worn out.

All Christian religions are outer-directed. "Who can I convert?" "Let's go to this country and make them Christians." "Wear this." "Do that." "No, don't worship that way. Worship this way or I'll kill you - for the good of your soul, of course." Meanwhile, followers of Eastern religions are sitting in the middle of their minds, experiencing a bliss and a level of consciousness that Western man can't begin to approach.

I'm on record as being understood to be a supporter of a reformed establishment, in which other Christian denominations, and other faiths, play a major part.

The long-term goal of Christians in politics should be to gain exclusive control over the franchise. Those who refuse to submit publicly to the eternal sanctions of God by submitting to His Church's public marks of the covenant-baptism and holy communion-must be denied citizenship.

Christian love must be chased after, aspired to, and practiced.

For liberals, religion and politics mix as long as the results support their cause.

I wrote this book [ Desperate Marriages] because of my own marriage. My wife and I struggled greatly in the early years of marriage. In spite of the fact that we were Christians before we got married, we prayed about getting married, we believed it was God's will for us to get married, and we still had great struggles.

I am proud to tell Hollywood that I am a Christian. For the first time I am now free to be myself.

One is not converted to christianity; one must be morbid enough for it.

What good is all this free-thinking, modernity, and turncoat flexibility if at some gut level you are still a Christian, a Catholic, and even a priest!

I condemn Christianity; I bring against the Christian Church the most terrible of all accusations that an accuser has ever had in his mouth. It is, to me, the greatest of all imaginable corruptions; it seeks to work the ultimate corruption, the worse possible corruption. The Christian Church has left nothing untouched by its depravity; it has turned every value into worthlessness, and every truth into a lie, and every integrity into baseness of soul.

A good Christian is a velvet-covered brick.