Clergy From The United States

"Personal religion has a supreme value for its own sake, not merely as a feeder of social morality, but as the highest unfolding of life itself, as the blossoming of our spiritual nature. Spiritual regeneration is the most important fact in any life history. A living experience of God is the crowning knowledge attainable to a human mind."

"If, therefore, our personal religious life is likely to be sapped by our devotion to social work, it would be a calamity second to none. But is it really likely that this will happen? The great aim underlying to whole social movement is the creation of a free, just, and brotherly social order. This is the greatest moral task conceivable. Its accomplishment is the manifest will of God for this generation. Every Christian motive is calling us to do it. If it is left undone, millions of lives will be condemned to a deepening moral degradation and to spiritual starvation. Does it look probable that we will lose our contact with God if we plunge too deeply into this work? Does it stand to reason that we shall go astray from Jesus Christ if we engage in the unequal conflict with organized wrong? What kind of ‘spirituality’ is it which is likely to get hurt by being put to work for justice and our fellow-men?"

"Some of the anxiety about personal religion is due to a subtle lack of faith in religion. Men think it is a fragile thing that will break up and vanish when the customs and formulas which have hitherto encased and protected it are broken and cast aside. Most of us have known religion in one form, and we suppose it can have no other. But religion is the life of God in the soul of man, and is God really so fragile?"

"Personal religion collapses with some individuals, because in their case it had long been growing hollow and thin. ... In reality there was little personal religion to lose, and that little would probably have been lost in some other way."

"A new factor enters the situation when we encounter the influence of ‘scientific socialism.’ It is true, the party platform declares that ‘religion is a private affair.’ The saving of souls is the only industry that socialism distinctly relegates to private enterprise."

"The socialism of continental Europe, taking it by and large, is actively hostile, not only to bad forms of organized religion, but to religion itself."

"We have to harmonize the two facts, that wealth is good and necessary, and that wealth is a danger to its possessor and to society. On the one hand property is indispensable to personal freedom, to all higher individuality, and to self-realization; the right to property is a corollary of the right to life; without property men are at the mercy of nature and in bondage to those who have property. On the other hand property is used as a means of collecting tribute and private taxes, as a club with which to extort unearned gain from laborers and consumers, and as the fundamental tool of oppression."

"Not until 1948, when I entered Crozer Theological Seminary in Chester, Pennsylvania, did I begin a serious intellectual quest for a method to eliminate social evil...I came early to Walter Rauschenbusch's Christianity and the Social Crisis, which left an indelible imprint on my thinking by giving me a theological basis for the social concern which had already grown up in me as a result of my early experiences. Of course there were points at which I differed with Rauschenbusch. I felt that he had fallen victim to the nineteenth-century "cult of inevitable progress" which led him to a superficial optimism concerning man's nature. Moreover, he came perilously close to identifying the Kingdom of God with a particular social and economic system-a tendency which should never befall the Church. But in spite of these shortcomings Rauschenbusch had done a great service for the Christian Church by insisting that the gospel deals with the whole man-not only his soul but his body; not only his spiritual well-being but his material well-being. It has been my conviction ever since reading Rauschenbusch that any religion that professes concern for the souls of men and is not equally concerned about the slums that damn them, the economic conditions that strangle them, and the social conditions that cripple them is a spiritually moribund religion only waiting for the day to be buried."

"Sense, brevity and point are the elements of a good proverb."

"Anxiety is the poison of human life ; the parent of many sins and of more miseries. – In a world where everything is doubtful, and where we may be disappointed, and be blessed in disappointment, why this restless stir and commotion of mind? – Can it alter the cause, or unravel the mystery of human events?"

"If rich men would remember that shrouds have no pockets, they would, while living, share their wealth with their children, and give for the good of others, and so know the highest pleasure that wealth can give."

"Temperance is to the body what religion is to the soul, the foundation and source of health and strength and peace."

"Thoroughly to teach another is the best way to learn for yourself."

"The highest attainment, as well as enjoyment of the spiritual life, is to be able at all times and in all things to say, 'Thy will be done.'"

"Whatever the place allocated us by providence, that is for us the post of honor and duty. – God estimates us not by the position we are in, but by the way in which we fill it."

"The first step to improvement, whether mental, moral, or religious, is to know ourselves – our weaknesses, errors, deficiencies, and sins, that, by divine grace, we may overcome and turn from them all."

"He is one of the noblest conquerors who carries on a successful warfare against his own appetites and passions, and has them under wise and full control."

"It has been said that science is opposed to, and in conflict with revelation. But the history of the former shows that the greater its progress, and the more accurate its investigations and results, the more plainly it is seen not only not to clash with the latter, but in all things to confirm it. The very sciences from which objections have been brought against religion have, by their own progress, removed those objections, and in the end furnished full confirmation of the inspired Word of God.”"

"Ridicule may be the evidence of wit or bitterness and may gratify a little mind, or an ungenerous temper, but it is no test of reason or truth."

"Sin with the multitude, and your responsibility and guilt are as great and as truly personal, as if you alone had done the wrong."

"Right actions for the future are the best apologies for wrong ones in the past – the best evidence of regret for them that we can offer, or the world receive."

"We should be as careful of the books we read, as of the company we keep. The dead very often have more power than the living."

"Always have a book at hand, in the parlor, on the table, for the family ; a book of condensed thought and striking anecdote, of sound maxims and truthful apothegms. It will impress on your own mind a thousand valuable suggestions, and teach your children a thousand lessons of truth and duty. Such a book is a casket of jewels for your household."

"The certainty of punishment, even more than its severity, is the preventive of crime."

"Contemplation is to knowledge, what digestion is to food – the way to get life out of it."

"We never do evil so thoroughly and heartily as when led to it by an honest but perverted, because mistaken, conscience."

"Compromise is but the sacrifice of one right or good in the hope of retaining another – too often ending in the loss of both."

"Between two evils, choose neither; between two goods, choose both."

"Never be so brief as to become obscure."

"Have something to say ; say it ; and stop when you’ve done."

"The leaves in autumn do not change color from the blighting touch of frost, but from the process of natural decay. They fall when the fruit is ripened, and their work is done. And their splendid coloring is but their graceful and beautiful surrender of life when they have finished their summer offering of service to God and man. And one of the great lessons the fall of the leaf teaches is this : Do your work well, and then be ready to depart when God shall call."

"The desires and longings of man are vast as eternity, and they point him to it."

"Prejudices are rarely overcome by argument; not being founded in reason they cannot be destroyed by logic."

"Anxiety is the rust of life, destroying its brightness and weakening its power. – A childlike and abiding trust in Providence is its best preventive and remedy."

"Anecdotes are sometimes the best vehicles of truth, and if striking and appropriate are often more impressive and powerful than argument."

"Age does not depend upon years, but upon temperament and health. Some men are born old, and some never grow so."

"Accuracy of statement is one of the first elements of truth; inaccuracy is a near kin to falsehood."

"Abuse of any one generally shows that he has marked traits of character. The stupid and indifferent are passed by in silence."

"Preventives of evil are far better than remedies; cheaper and easier of application, and surer in result."

"The prejudiced and obstinate man does not so much hold opinions, as his opinions hold him."

"He that is possessed with a prejudice is possessed with a devil, and one of the worst kind of devils, for it shuts out the truth, and often leads to ruinous error."

"Sinful and forbidden pleasures are like poisoned bread; they may satisfy appetite for the moment, but there is death in them at the end."

"Some men are born old, and some never seem so. If we keep well and cheerful we are always young, and at last die in youth, even when years would count us old."

"There is often as much independence in not being led, as in not being driven."

"True humility is not an abject, groveling, self-despising spirit ; it is but a right estimate of ourselves as God sees us."

"Hell is truth seen too late — duty neglected in its season."

"Any act often repeated soon forms a habit : and habit allowed, steadily gains in strength. — At first it may be but as the spider’s web, easily broken through, but if not resisted it soon binds us with chains of steel."

"Science has sometimes been said to be opposed to faith, and inconsistent with it. But all science, in fact, rests on a basis of faith, for it assumes the permanence and uniformity of natural laws – a thing which can never be demonstrated."

"Fables, like parables, are more ancient than formal arguments and are often the most effective means of presenting and impressing both truth and duty."

"Facts are God’s arguments : we should be careful never to misunderstand or pervert them."