#christianity

Like apes, we breed, sleep, and die. Yet like God we say, "I am." We are ontological oxymorons. ↗

— Peter Kreeft

#christianity #god #jesus-shock #ontological-oxymoron #ontology

God defines himself as "I am who I am", which also means: My being is such that I shall always be present in every moment of becoming. ↗

— Hans Urs von Balthasar

#christianity #eternal-father #god #god-father #spirituality

One of the most amazing and perplexing features of mainstream Christianity is that seminarians who learn the historical-critical method in their Bible classes appear to forget all about it when it comes time for them to be pastors. They are taught critical approaches to Scripture, they learn about the discrepancies and contradictions, they discover all sorts of historical errors and mistakes, they come to realize that it is difficult to know whether Moses existed or what Jesus actually said and did, they find that there are other books that were at one time considered canonical but that ultimately did not become part of Scripture (for example, other Gospels and Apocalypses), they come to recognize that a good number of the books of the Bible are pseudonymous (for example, written in the name of an apostle by someone else), that in fact we don't have the original copies of any of the biblical books but only copies made centuries later, all of which have been altered. They learn all of this, and yet when they enter church ministry they appear to put it back on the shelf. For reasons I will explore in the conclusion, pastors are, as a rule, reluctant to teach what they learned about the Bible in seminary. ↗

— Bart D. Ehrman

#church #god #ministry #pastor #religion

Our identity rests in God's relentless tenderness for us revealed in Jesus Christ. ↗

— Brennan Manning

#christianity #gentleness #god #identity #tenderness

God knew my needs and took care accordingly. ↗

— Louis Zamperini

#christianity #god #jesus #testimony #world-war-ii

The highest glory of the American Revolution was this: it connected in one indissoluble bond the principles of civil government with the principles of Christianity. ↗

— John Quincy Adams

#american revolution #bond #christianity #civil #civil government

If we who follow Christ, with all the facts before us and knowing what we are about, deliberately choose the kingdom of God as our sphere of interest, I see no reason why anyone should object. If we lose by it, the loss is our own; if we gain, we rob no one by so doing. ↗

— A.W. Tozer

#life #religion #religion

With reference to other religions, the Church sees a great difference between them and herself. The other religions are expressions of the human soul seeking God, with some beautiful spiritual insights, but also not without errors. Christianity is rather God seeking humanity. ↗

— Francis Arinze

#beautiful #between #christianity #church #difference

Perhaps as good a classification as any of the main types is that of the three lusts distinguished by traditional Christianity - the lust of knowledge, the lust of sensation, and the lust of power. ↗

— Irving Babbitt

#christianity #classification #distinguished #good #knowledge

Because I was raised in a Christian culture I never considered myself to be a totally free human being. ↗

— James Baldwin

#condemnation #freedom #religion #freedom