Quotes About Church

What Paul is saying is that when we "do church," we are to do it in a proper and fitting manner. There should be order, not chaos. There should be sensibility, not insensitivity. There should be consistency, not discord. There should be guidance, not irresponsibility.

The Church must be intelligible to the simple as well as to the shrewd.

I must not take this or that doctrine by itself; but I must make up my mind whether or no it is the one only Catholic Church, and then I shall believe all that she teaches, because she teaches it, and not because I understand it.

the Catholic Church, therefore, that strange mingling of mystery and common-sense, that union of earth and heaven, of clay and fire, can alone be understood by him who accepts her as both Divine and Human,

The Church, then, is too much interested in men and too much absorbed in God. Of course she is too much interested and too much absorbed, for she alone knows the value and capacity of both; she who is herself both Divine and Human.

A Lutheran pastor in Illinois writes: A great deal of the work in our church is done by non-paid individuals who, at times, hurt the feelings of fellow volunteers. Do you have any thoughts on what to do with mean people who volunteer their time?

A Stanford graduate student told me that his wife and kids resisted going to church on Sundays because they dreaded encounters with a family of braggarts and bullies so much. Then his family switched to an earlier service that the despised family never attended: the student's wife and kids not only stopped resisting and complaining about going to church; everyone came back from church in far better moods. The Lord works in mysterious ways.

Leadership that is not well-grounded in followership—following Jesus—is dangerous to both the church and the world.41

The issue of singing hymns versus Psalms split churches, including the one in

To Him be glory in the church by Christ Jesus to all generations, forever and ever. Amen. – Ephesians 3:21

Jesus] walks in the midst of the seven golden lampstands. – Revelation 2:1

not forsaking the assembling of ourselves together. – Hebrews 10:25

Sadly, the accounts of divorce, spousal and child molestation, infidelity, and substance abuse are almost indistinguishable between church-attending and non-church-attending people.

But in every church there are people who, for reasons which seem sufficient to them, do not approve of their pastor and seek to harry him and bully him into some condition pleasing to themselves. The democracy which the Reformation brought into the Christian Church rages in their bosoms like a fire; they would deny that they regard their clergyman as their spiritual hired hand, whom they boss and oversee for his own good, but that is certainly the impression they give to observers.

In 1543, Polish astronomer and priest Nicolaus Copernicus (1473–1543) put our corner of the universe in order, suggesting that the Sun and not Earth was at the center of our planetary system. The idea contradicted the teachings of the Church, but was eventually proved by Galileo.

A famous instance of this kind of abuse comes from Basel in 1529, when a mob carried a crucifix from the church, through the streets, and into the marketplace, tossing it onto a bonfire while a particularly zealous citizen exclaimed, "If you are God, help yourself; if you are man, then bleed!

Under the direction of the patriarch Niketas (741–775), iconoclasts removed figurative portraits (probably saints' busts) from the council hall of the church of Hagia Sophia and replaced them with plain crosses.31 Already, by 743, Constantine V had rebuilt the earthquake-damaged church of Hagia Eirene and ordered its apse decorated with a simple, unadorned cross. Somewhat surprisingly, this cross has remained its sole decoration to this day.

It needs to be emphasized that the Church vigorously advocated and defended democracy in northern Italy. Not only did the Church unequivocally assert moral equality, but it also ventured into the political arena, with bishops and cardinals playing a leading role on behalf of expanding the franchise.

Laws requiring a certain frequency of church attendance, the taking of Communion, and baptism of infants soon appeared all across the Lutheran areas of Germany. So did laws excluding all religious nonconformists, especially Jews.

However, as in Scandinavia, the Church of England clergy are unionized and recently forced the Church to rescind a rule defrocking clergy convicted of felonies, on grounds that such convictions might have been miscarriages of justice.

When the Bishop of Gloucester systematically tested Church of England diocesan clergy in 1551, of 311 pastors, 171 could not repeat the Ten Commandments, and 27 did not know the author of the Lord's Prayer.

The only common feature of the three successful Reformations was their rejection of papal authority; otherwise they were quite at odds.

Encouraged by the Scholastics and embodied in the great medieval universities founded by the church, faith in the power of reason infused Western culture, stimulating the pursuit of science and the evolution of democratic theory and practice.

Bishops and cardinals were among the very best clients of 'usurers'. That is not surprising since nearly everyone holding an elite Church position had purchased his office as an investment, anticipating a substantial return from Church revenues.