Quotes from N. T. Wright

Death is the ultimate weapon of the tyrant; resurrection does not make a covenant with death, it overthrows it.

It is faith alone that justifies, but faith that justifies can never be alone, though one is justified by faith alone, the faith which justifies is never in fact alone.

Almost all the early Christian Fathers were opposed to the death penalty, even though it was of course standard practice across the ancient world.

Within orthodoxy, there is always a danger of faith collapsing into fear.

All Christian language about the future is a set of signposts pointing into a mist.

Salvation, then, is not "going to heaven" but "being raised to life in God's new heaven and new earth.

people who believe in the resurrection, in God making a whole new world in which everything will be set right at last, are unstoppably motivated to work for that new world in the present.

spirituality is a private hobby, an upmarket version of daydreaming for those who like that kind of thing.

I feel about John ['s gospel] like I feel about my wife; I love her very much, but I wouldn't claim to understand her. (Following Jesus, p. 27.)

Many people think that being Christian makes you sort of subhuman or, at least, less than fully human. Guys out there on the street (people think) are having a wonderful time enjoying human life to the fullest, and we in the church are sort of cramped and constricted. Well, things shouldn't be that way. Being a Christian is supposed to make you more truly human , more fully yourself. That means that you are supposed to become somebody who is reflecting the image of God.

we will arrange for 'religion' to become a small subdepartment of ordinary life; it will be quite safe – harmless, in fact – with church life carefully separated off from everything else in the world, whether politics, art, sex, economics, or whatever.

28"Are you having a real struggle? Come to me! Are you carrying a big load on your back? Come to me—I'll give you a rest! 29Pick up my yoke and put it on; take lessons from me! My heart is gentle, not arrogant. You'll find the rest you deeply need. 30My yoke is easy to wear; my load is easy to bear.

If what we want is God's justice, coming to sort things out, we will do better to get entirely out of the way and let God do his own work, rather than supposing our burst of anger (which will most likely have all sorts of nasty bits to it, such as wounded pride, malice and envy) will somehow help God do what needs to be done.

All history involves selection, and it is always human beings who do the selecting.

But the voice goes on, calling us, beckoning us, luring us to think that there might be such a thing as justice, as the world being put to rights, even though we find it so elusive. We're like moths trying to fly to the moon. We all know there's something called justice, but we can't quite get to it.

A tectonic plate's got to do what a tectonic plate's got to do.

La belleza, como la justicia, se nos escurre entre los dedos. Fotografiamos una puesta de sol, pero todo lo que conseguimos es el recuerdo del momento, no el instante en sí.

Caesar's messengers didn't go round the world saying, 'Caesar is lord, so if you feel you need to have a Roman-empire kind of experience, you might want to submit to him'.

Dust we are, and to dust we shall return. But God can do new things with dust.

There is no reason in principle why the question, what precisely happened at Easter, cannot be raised by any historian of any persuasion. Even if some Christians might wish to rule it off limits, they have (presumably) no a priori right to tell other historians, whether Muslims, Jews, Hindus, Buddhists, New Agers, gnostics, agnostics, or anyone else, what they may and may not study.

Todos sabemos lo que debemos hacer (detalle más o detalle menos), pero todos nos las ingeniamos, al menos parte del tiempo, para no hacerlo.

But the point about spiritual fruit is that, however healthy the tree, it has to be looked after.

La belleza apunta hacia afuera del mundo presente, a uno totalmente diferente.

Honramos y celebramos nuestra complejidad y nuestra simplicidad haciendo continuamente cinco cosas. Contamos historias. Realizamos rituales. Creamos belleza. Trabajamos en comunidades. Meditamos en creencias.