quotations about church
The church must grope her way into the alleys and courts and purlieus of the city, and up the broken staircases, and into the bare room, and beside the loathsome sufferer; she must go down into the pit with the miner, into the forecastle with the sailor, into the tent with the soldier, into the shop with the mechanic, into the factory with the operative, into the field with the farmer, into the counting room with the merchant. Like the air, the church must press equally on all the surfaces of society; like the sea, flow into every nook of the shoreline of humanity; and like the sun, shine on things foul and low as well as fair and high, for she was organized, commissioned, and equipped for the moral renovation of the whole world.
BISHOP SIMPSON
attributed, Holy Thoughts on Holy Things
The more rabidly mad the church the more pews will be filled. So fundy evangelists have the biggest, and most profitable, congregations. More moderate churches with some respect for humans as intelligent human beings are losing numbers. I think a big revival would happen in the churches if child sacrifice was reintroduced. The old symbolic body and blood just doesn't cut it anymore.
PETER KELLY
attributed, The Quotable Atheist
Church was never meant to be a place for gods to gather, but for devils wanting to shed their horns for halos.
RICHELLE E. GOODRICH
Being Bold
Take me to church
I'll worship like a dog at the shrine of your lies
I'll tell you my sins and you can sharpen your knife
Offer me that deathless death
Good God, let me give you my life
HOZIER
"Take Me to Church"
That which is destroying the Church is not the outward groping of those within it nor the inward groping of those without, but the professionals who control it and who have removed the bells from its steeples.
WILLIAM FAULKNER
Light in August
Surely as a man may say of a rock--nothing more quiet, because it is never stirred; and yet nothing more unquiet, because it is ever assaulted--so we may say of the church--nothing more peaceable, because it is established upon a rock; and yet nothing more unpeaceable, because that rock is in the midst of seas, winds, enemies, and persecutions.
EDWARD REYNOLDS
Explication of the Hundred and Tenth Psalm
There are ten church-members by inheritance for one by conviction.
AUSTIN O'MALLEY
Keystones of Thought
The church is important only as it ministers to purity of heart and life; and every church which so ministers is a good one; no matter how, when, or where it grew up; no matter whether it worship on its knees, or on its feet, or whether its ministers are ordained by pope, bishop, presbyter, or people; these are secondary things, and of no comparative moment. The church which opens on heaven is that, and that only, in which the spirit of heaven dwells. The church where worship rises to God's ear is that, and that only, where the soul ascends. No matter whether it be gathered in cathedral or barn; whether it sit in silence or send up a hymn; whether the minister speak from carefully prepared notes, or from immediate, fervent, irrepressible suggestion. If God be loved, and Jesus Christ be welcomed to the soul, and his instructions be meekly and wisely heard, and the solemn purpose grow up to do all duty amidst all conflict, sacrifice, and temptation, then the true end of the church is answered.
WILLIAM E. CHANNING
Thoughts
The church is no more religion than the masonry of the aqueduct is the water that flows through it.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit
Nothing doth so much keep men out of the Church, and drive men out of the Church, as breach of unity.
FRANCIS BACON
Essays
The day we find the perfect church, it becomes imperfect the moment we join it.
CHARLES H. SPURGEON
attributed, Deciduous Belief
The Church is a conspiracy to corrupt men's morals.
ABRAHAM MILLER
Unmoral Maxims
When a man unites with the church, he should not come saying, "I am so holy that I think I must go in among the saints," but, "O brethren, I find I am so weak and wicked that I cannot stand alone; so, if you can help me, open the door and let me enter."
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Life Thoughts
Every day, people are straying away from the church and going back to God.
LENNY BRUCE
The Essential Lenny Bruce
The church alone beyond all question
Has for ill-gotten goods the right digestion.
JOHANN WOLFGANG VON GOETHE
Faust
Why did men worship in churches, locking themselves away in the dark, when the world lay beyond its doors in all its real glory?
CHARLES DE LINT
The Little Country
We in the church have humility and contrition to offer the world, not a formula for success. Almost alone in our success-oriented society, we admit that we have failed, are failing, and always will fail.
PHILIP YANCEY
Reaching for the Invisible God: What Can We Expect to Find?
It belongs to the church to suffer blows, not to strike them.
BEZA
attributed, Day's Collacon
I am suspicious of that church whose members are one in their beliefs and opinions. When a tree is dead, it will lie any way; alive, it will have its own growth. When men's deadness is in the church, and their life elsewhere, all will be alike. They can be cut and polished any way. When they are alive, they are like a tropical forest--some shooting up, like the mahogany tree; some spreading, like the vine; some darkling, like the shrub; some lying, herb-like, on the ground; but all obeying their own laws of growth--a common law of growth variously expressed in each--and so contributing to the richness and beauty of the wood.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Life Thoughts
A glorious Church is like a magnificent feast; there is all the variety that may be, but every one chooses out a dish or two that he likes, and lets the rest alone: how glorious soever the Church is, every one chooses out of it his own religion, by which he governs himself, and lets the rest alone.
JOHN SELDEN
Table Talk, 1686