Best 3954 quotes in «church quotes» category

The reason there’s no oneness and no harmony in the church is because the believers don’t habitually walk in the light and they don’t constantly allow God’s light (knowledge) to shine in them.

The redemption of a country depends on the position of the church

There has been a rediscovery of the meaning of baptism as entrance and integration into the Church, of "ecclesiological" significance. But ecclesiology, unless it is given its true cosmic perspective ("for the life of the world"), unless it is understood as the christian form of "cosmology," is always ecclesiolatry, the Church considered as a "being in itself" and not the new relation of god, man and the world.

There has never been a meaningful life built on easy street.

...[T]here howl your pagans; where you ever find them, next door to you; under the long-flung shadow, and the snug patronizing lee of churches. For by some curious fatality, as it is often noted of your metropolitan freebooters that they ever encamp around the halls of justice, so sinners, gentlemen, most abound in holiest vicinities.

There is a difference between a church that prays and a praying church. One has prayer programs. The other develops a prayer culture.

There is also the significance of the crown of thorns for the church, God's redeemed people. It reminds us that Christ is a King and that he is victorious even when he seems defeated. However abased Christ may appear to me he is still a King. He accomplishes a regal task at Calvary and gains for us a royal pardon. He ascends a throne as he goes to be crucified, a throne of grace. In this apparent weakness he is the mighty Conqueror of Satan and sin and death, the Overcomer of this world. The cross appears as foolishness to the world, but to God's redeemed people that cross is victory, salvation, the power of God.

There is a growing disconnect between those who lead and the grass roots movements of lay mission and service. The Church remains mired in culture wars, wringing its hands over shrinking attendance, and trying to save itself by better budgeting in the wake of shrinking resources. The institutional Church of today struggles to sustain aging structures, repeatedly tries to force uniformity over unity, and desperately attempts to create diversity by legislation at conventions. The world has changed, and we are at a loss for how to respond.

There is a lost and dying world out there. They need to see that the Church is different from their socially-segregated high schools. They need to see a 'family' operating as a team, not a bunch of cliques playing a role.

There is a long and well-documented tradition of wisdom in the Christian faith that any venture into leadership, whether by laity or clergy, is hazardous. it is necessary that there be leaders, but woe to those who become leaders.

There is a Marian "style" to the Church's work of evangelization. Whenever we look to Mary, we come to believe once again in the revolutionary nature of love and tenderness. in her we see that humility and tenderness ar enot virtues of the weak but of the strong, who need not treat others poorly in order to feel important themselves. Contemplating Mary, we realize that she who praised God for "bringing down the mighty from their thrones" and "sending the rich away empty" (Luke 1:52-53) is also the one who brings a homely warmth to our pursuit of justice. She is also the one who carefully keeps "all these things, pondering them in heart" (Luke 2:19). Mary is able to recognize the traces of God's Spirit in events great and small. She constantly contemplates the mystery of God in our world, in human history, and in our daily lives. She is the woman of prayer and work in Nazareth, and she is also Our Lady of Help, who sets out from her town "with haste" (Luke 1:39) to be of service to others. This interplay of justice and tenderness, of contemplation and concern for others, is what makes the ecclesial community look to Mary as a model of evangelization.

There is an obsession in the Church with sin management. People think more about their sins than about their redemption through Jesus

There is error in a church when miracles are made the only thing.

There is good even in church people. You find it hard to believe, right? Jesus never shut the door on religious people. He just made sure that they understand He was that door, and not their deeds and tasks. Some of us, even I, need to be reminded of this. This being understood, the people of the church are like broken pieces of glass fixed into beautiful mosaic to reflect Jesus. The picture is beautiful, but the pieces do indeed still have sharp edges that can cut.

There is no one true church, no one chosen people.

There is no such thing as perfection in a church. Instead, what you should be looking for is a covenanted body, a leadership team that has the goods for coaching you in Christ, and a place where you can invest yourself - from cleaning toilets to teaching what you know to ministering in song.

There is no use trying to do Church work without love. A doctor, a lawyer, may do good work without love, but God's work cannot be done without love.

There is, perhaps, no stronger contrast between the revolutionary times in which we live and the Catholic ages, or even the period of the Reformation, than in this: that the influence which religious motives formerly possessed is now in a great measure exercised by political opinions. As the theory of the balance of power was adopted in Europe as a substitute for the influence of religious ideas, incorporated in the power of the Popes, so now political zeal occupies the place made vacant by the decline of religious fervour, and commands to an almost equal extent the enthusiasm of men. It has risen to power at the expense of religion, and by reason of its decline, and naturally regards the dethroned authority with the jealousy of a usurper. This revolution in the relative position of religious and political ideas was the inevitable consequence of the usurpation by the Protestant State of the functions of the Church, and of the supremacy which, in the modern system of government, it has assumed over her. It follows also that the false principles by which religious truth was assailed have been transferred to the political order, and that here, too, Catholics must be prepared to meet them; whilst the objections made to the Church on doctrinal grounds have lost much of their attractiveness and effect, the enmity she provokes on political grounds is more intense. It is the same old enemy with a new face. No reproach is more common, no argument better suited to the temper of these times, than those which are founded on the supposed inferiority or incapacity of the Church in political matters. As her dogma, for instance, is assailed from opposite sides,—as she has had to defend the divine nature of Christ against the Ebionites, and His humanity against Docetism, and was attacked both on the plea of excessive rigorism and excessive laxity (Clement Alex., Stromata, iii. 5),—so in politics she is arraigned on behalf of the political system of every phase of heresy. She was accused of favouring revolutionary principles in the time of Elizabeth and James I., and of absolutist tendencies under James II. and his successors. Since Protestant England has been divided into two great political parties, each of these reproaches has found a permanent voice in one of them. Whilst Tory writers affirm that the Catholic religion is the enemy of all conservatism and stability, the Liberals consider it radically opposed to all true freedom.

There may be no English word as bent and broken by casual misuse, or drained of blood by idealizing admirers and apologists, or grossly caricatured by huckstering detractors, as church.

The renewal of the Church will come from a new type of monasticism which only has in common with the old an uncompromising allegiance to the Sermon on the Mount. It is high time people banded together to do this.

The Responsibility Of The Local Church Is To Help People Discover What They Are Created For

There’s no stronger bulwark of sound conservatism than the evangelical church, and no better place to make friends who’ll help you to gain your rightful place in the community than in your own church-home!

There's not enough wrong with it to leave and there's just enough wrong with it to stay," Matthew later told me. "Fight to change it.

The secret of real prosperity in the church is to teach God’s people principles of economic empowerment

there was music . . . after church and food, like the third point in a holy trinity

The Rochester group [of VOTF], however, was met with some concern as they found it hard to believe my account as it unfolded before them. I feel that some people have a hard time with the truths around us, not only the sexual abuse by priests, but all bad things. I call it chosen ignorance. This modified form of ignorance is found in people who, if confronted with certain truths realize that they have to accept them and thereby acknowledge evil, and that scares them. Opening up and letting the truth in might knock them off their perceived center. It is too hard, period." (VOTF - Voice of the Faithful - a Catholic group that wants to change the Church, keep the faith.)

There will come a time when people hungering for the truth will seek it where it is supposedly disseminated, such as books and churches, but they will not hear the Word of the Lord. Instead of receiving a message to satisfy their spiritual longings, they will hear a sermon on some current political or social problem, or a sermonette on art and literature. And so they wander from one place to another, going from hope to despair, and eventually giving up.

The secret to strong leaders is that strong leaders are strong because they have been tempered by the negative. They have discovered the secret of combining the negative and the positive to PRODUCED their very own POWER plant!

The task is to become church for them, among them and with them, and under Spirit of God to lead them to become church in their own culture.

The story of Balaam is also a good reminder that just because a person can flow in the gifts of the Holy Spirit doesn't mean they have character.

The task of liturgy is to order the life of the holy community following the text of Holy Scripture. It consists of two movements. First it gets us into the sanctuary, the place of adoration and attention, listening and receiving and believing before God. There is a lot involved, all the parts of our lives ordered to all aspects of the revelation of God in Jesus. Then it gets us out of the sanctuary into the world into places of obeying and loving ordering our lives as living sacrifices in the world to the glory of God. There is a lot involved, all the parts of our lives out on the street participating in the work of salvation.

The story of the angel announcing what the church calls the immaculate conception, is not so much as mentioned in the books ascribed to Mark, and John; and is differently related in Matthew and Luke. The former says the angel, appeared to Joseph; the latter says, it was to Mary; but either Joseph or Mary was the worst evidence that could have been thought of; for it was others that should have testified for them, and not they for themselves. Were any girl that is now with child to say, and even to swear it, that she was gotten with child by a ghost, and that an angel told her so, would she be believed? Certainly she would not. Why then are we to believe the same thing of another girl whom we never saw, told by nobody knows who, nor when, nor where? How strange and inconsistent is it, that the same circumstance that would weaken the belief even of a probable story, should be given as a motive for believing this one, that has upon the face of it every token of absolute impossibility and imposture.

The story that the church has been telling for two thousand years is an outrageous tale about a man who was executed by the state but rose up from the dead. The crux of the story isn't that Jesus figured out the right answer to all the questions facing Israel in his day. What makes all the difference is that Jesus defeated the ultimate enemy and got up from the dead.

The temple is a place of beauty, it is a place of revelation, it is a place of peace. It is the house of the Lord. It is holy unto the Lord. It should be holy unto us.

The tradition of going to church every day of the week is not an indicator of greatness.

The three Secrets of Fatima were closely held by the Vatican for decades, until the text of the third and last secret was finally released in 2000.

The top 10% of the people who are most creative, constructive and thoughtful, do not have much to do with churches. To them the canons of reason come first, making faith secondary and questionable.

The true Church of Jesus Christ will never be overwhelmed by the world. The waters may swirl around us, but the Lord has promised to build His Church and keep it strong until He returns. One thing must be avoided at all costs. We must not let the world seep into the Church. When we let the world dilute our Gospel and water down our values, we'll disappear from sight. Let's keep the Church holy - and wholly committed to Scripture. The chief danger of the Church today is that it's trying to get on the same side as the world, instead of trying to turn the world upside down.

The verbal tool of exploring mystery together is not confrontation or preaching but dialogue. We subject ourselves to the same questions we pose to others, and as we traverse them together, we may arrive at surprising conclusions we could never have reached when simply trying to defeat one another's logic. Our questions are open ended, granting the other person the freedom to respond or not to respond. The questions stick with us, even haunt us, long after we ask them, and we await insight together. The process is more important than an immediate decision.

The village lay in the hollow, and climbed, with very prosaic houses, the other side. Village architecture does not flourish in Scotland. The blue slates and the grey stone are sworn foes to the picturesque; and though I do not, for my own part, dislike the interior of an old-fashioned pewed and galleried church, with its little family settlements on all sides, the square box outside, with its bit of a spire like a handle to lift it by, is not an improvement to the landscape. Still, a cluster of houses on differing elevations - with scraps of garden coming in between, a hedgerow with clothes laid out to dry, the opening of a street with its rural sociability, the women at their doors, the slow waggon lumbering along - gives a centre to the landscape. It was cheerful to look at, and convenient in a hundred ways. ("The Open Door")

The voice welling up out of this little man is terrific, Harry had noticed it at the house, but here, in the nearly empty church, echoing off the walnut knobs and memorial plaques and high arched rafters, beneath the tall central window of Jesus taking off into the sky with a pack of pastel apostles for a launching pad, the timbre is doubled, richer, with a rounded sorrowful something Rabbit hadn't noticed hitherto, gathering and pressing the straggle of guests into a congregation, subduing any fear that this ceremony might be a farce. Laugh at ministers all you want, they have the words we need to hear, the ones the dead have spoken.

The way we saw things, it didn’t matter that God had created the heavens and the earth—he did not want us excited about living here. A good fundamentalist worth his weight in guilt was quick to remind any skeptic that the world was going to hell in a handbasket.

The wealthy, Jesus says, can only get into heaven through the eye of a needle; the same applies to churches wealthy in numbers and programs.

The word miracle, as pronounced by Christian churches, gives a false impression; it is a monster. It is not one with the blowing clover and the falling rain.

The word church as applied to the Christian society was first used by Jesus Himself when He told Peter, “Upon this rock I will build my church” [Matthew 16:18]. He is the foundation of all Christian experience.

The Word that will change a man must first show the man who he really is.

The world does not give money to those who spend 24hrs church everyday praying for financial miracles.

The work of an apostle, from the first ones sent out by Jesus to anyone aligned with the reign of peace, is to be God's loving word to every part of the world. Echoing the Word, they are sent out to confront the powers and principalities by rejecting state violence and revolutionary violence, and, instead putting on the armor of peace.

The world is my church. My actions are my prayer. My behavior is my creed.

The world is waiting to see what the church has to offer to this troubled society