Theologian Quotes - Page 19

• A gentle sense of humor will be alert to detect anything that savors of a pious 'act' on the part of the penitent.

  Thomas Merton

  Sense Of Humor, Gentle, Pious

  Thomas Merton (1960). “Spiritual Direction and Meditation”, p.40, Liturgical Press

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• Christianity is a strangely cheery religion.

  Flannery O'Connor

  Christianity

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• Only man had dignity; only man, therefore, can be funny.

  Ronald Knox

  Men, Dignity

  Essays in Satire by Ronald Knox, Introduction, 1928.

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• A smile across the aisle of a bus in the morning could save a suicide later in the day.

  Fulton J. Sheen

  Suicide, Morning, Bus

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• Keep company with the more cheerful sort of the Godly; there is no mirth like the mirth of believers.

  Richard Baxter

  Godly, Cheerful, Mirth

  Richard Baxter, William Orme (1830). “The Practical Works of the Rev. Richard Baxter, with a Life of the Author, and a Critical Examination of His Writings”, p.24

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• The lover knows much more about absolute good and universal beauty than any logician or theologian, unless the latter, too, be lovers in disguise.

  George Santayana

  Love, Beauty, Wisdom

  George Santayana (2015). “The Life of Reason: Human Understanding”, p.30, 谷月社

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• Lord, give me a sense of humor so that I may take some happiness from this life and share it with others.

  Thomas More

  Giving, May, Sense Of Humor

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• The doctor sees all the weakness of mankind; the lawyer all the wickedness, the theologian all the stupidity.

  Arthur Schopenhauer

  Stupid, Silly, Doctors

  Arthur Schopenhauer (2007). “Parerga and Paralipomena: A Collection of Philosophical Essays”, Cosimo, Inc.

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• O God, make the bad people good, and the good people nice

  Philip Yancey

  Nice, People, Good People

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• Theologians have a great problem because they're seeking to speak about God. Since God is the ground of everything that is, there's a sense in which every human inquiry is grist to the theological mill. Obviously, no theologian can know everything.

  John Polkinghorne

  Inquiry, Problem, Speak

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• After chiding the theologian for his reliance on myth and miracle, science found itself in the unenviable position of having to create mythology of its own: namely, the assumption that what, after long effort, could not be proved to take place today had, in truth, taken place in the primeval past.

  Loren Eiseley

  Taken, Past, Origin Of Life

  Loren Eiseley (2011). “The Immense Journey: An Imaginative Naturalist Explores the Mysteries of Man and Nature”, p.199, Vintage

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• As set forth by theologians, the idea of 'God' is an argument that assumes its own conclusions, and proves nothing.

  Johann Most

  Ideas, Agnostic, Assuming

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• Philosophers and theologians have argued for centuries over the morality of targeted assassinations - a technique that the Israelis use with some frequency - without ever reaching anything approaching consensus.

  Eric Alterman

  Technique, Use, Morality

  "Dick Cheney's Shadow Government" by Eric Alterman, www.realclearpolitics.com. July 14, 2009.

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• You want to protect your child from pain, and what you get instead is life, and grace; and though theologians insist that grace is freely given, the truth is that sometimes you pay for it through the nose. And you can't pay your child's way.

  Anne Lamott

  Children, Pain, Grace

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• But let there be no misunderstanding: it is not that a real man, the object of knowledge, philosophical reflection or technological intervention, has been substituted for the soul, the illusion of theologians. The man described for us, whom we are invited to free, is already in himself the effect of a subjection more profound than himself. A 'soul' inhabits him and brings him to existence, which is itself a factor in the mastery that power exercises over the body. The soul is the effect and instrument of a political anatomy; the soul is the prison of the body.

  Michel Foucault

  Real, Philosophical, Exercise

  "Discipline and Punish". Book by Michel Foucault, 1977.

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• I'm sorry to see that again we are turning to the courts for decisions that concern ethics. I think theologians and ethicists would better guide us in such matters, ... If my memory serves me well, more than a decade ago The Episcopal Church said euthanasia or the intentional shortening of an individual's life, by lethal doses of drugs or otherwise, was not acceptable.

  Susan P. Crawford

  Sorry, Memories, Thinking

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• The theologian may indulge the pleasing task of describing Religion as she descended from Heaven, arrayed in her native purity. A more melancholy duty is imposed on the historian. He must discover the inevitable mixture of error and corruption which she contracted in a long residence upon Earth, among a weak and degenerate race of beings.

  Edward Gibbon

  Errors, Race, Long

  Edward Gibbon (2009). “The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (Edited and Abridged): Abridged Edition”, p.237, Modern Library

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• Is not Jesus pointing to children even as models for grownups?

  Pope John Paul II

  Jesus, Children, Models

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• I am no theologian. I would not be surprised, however, if Heaven proved to be a cozy kitchen, where delicious treats appeared in the oven and in the refrigerator whenever you wanted them, and where the cupboards were full of good books.

  Dean Koontz

  Book, Heaven, Kitchen

  Dean Koontz (2016). “The Complete Odd Thomas 8-Book Bundle: Odd Thomas, Forever Odd, Brother Odd, Odd Hours, Odd Apocalypse, Odd Interlude, Deeply Odd, Saint Odd”, p.891, Bantam

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• Imitation is very easy, and the whole culture and society depends on imitation. Everybody is telling you how to behave, and whatsoever they are teaching you is nothing but imitation. Religious people - the so-called religious people, the priests, the theologians - they are also teaching you, `Be like Jesus, be like Buddha, be like Krishna.` Nobody ever tells you, `Just be yourself` - nobody. Everybody is against you, it seems. Nobody allows you to be yourself, nobody gives you any freedom. You can be in this world, but you must imitate somebody.

  Rajneesh

  Being Yourself, Religious, Jesus

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• I'm a scientist, not a theologian. I don't know if there is a God or not. Religion requires certainty.

  James Lovelock

  If There Is A God, Scientist, Certainty

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• The theologian considers sin mainly as an offence against God; the moral philosopher as contrary to reasonableness.

  Thomas Aquinas

  Powerful, Philosopher, Moral

  Saint Thomas Aquinas (1951). “Philosophical Texts”, London : Oxford University Press

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• The yearning to know what cannot be known, to comprehend the incomprehensible, to touch and taste the unapproachable, arises from the image of God in the nature of man. Deep calleth unto deep, and though polluted and landlocked by the mighty disaster theologians call the Fall, the soul senses its origin and longs to return to its source.

  Aiden Wilson Tozer

  Fall, Men, Soul

  Aiden Wilson Tozer (1965). “The Knowledge of the Holy”, p.12, Fig

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• I am no theologian. I am a layman. I am among those who are preached to, and who listen. It is not for me to preach. I should not willingly forego being a listener, a man who reads the Gospels and then listens to what others say that our Lord meant. But sometimes a listener speaks out, and listens to his own voice.

  Haniel Long

  Men, Speaks Out, Voice

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• It is an old habit with theologians to beat the living with the bones of the dead.

  Robert Green Ingersoll

  Old Habits, Bones, Beats

  Robert Green Ingersoll (1907). “The works of Robert G. Ingersoll”, p.2025, Library of Alexandria

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