Quotes about Christ

Even though Christ Himself would not deliver us from the power of the Totalitarian State, as He did not deliver Himself, we must see His purpose in it all. Maybe his children are being persecuted by the world in order that they might withdraw themselves from the world. Maybe His most violent enemies may be doing His work negatively, for it could be the mission of totalitarianism to preside over the liquidation of a modern world that became indifferent to God and His moral laws.

Many a modern preacher is far less concerned with preaching Christ and Him crucified than he is with his popularity with his congregation. A want of intellectual backbone makes him straddle the ox of truth and the ass of nonsense. Bending the knee to the mob rather than God would probably make them scruple at ever playing the role of John the Baptist before a modern Herod. The acids of modernity are eating away the fossils of orthodoxy.

As scientific truths put us in an intelligent relaton with the cosmos, as historic truth puts us in temporal relation with the rise and fall of civilization, so does Christ put us in intelligent relation with God the Father; for He is the only possible Word by which God can address Himself to a world of sinners.

Conscience, Christ, and the gift of faith make evil men uneasy in their sin. They feel that if they could drive Christ from the earth, they would be free from moral inhibitions. They forget that it is their own nature and conscience which makes them feel that way. Being unable to drive God from the heavens, they would drive his ambassadors from the earth. In a lesser sphere, that is why many men sneer at virtue--because it makes vice uncomfortable.

The priest acts from without, the Holy Spirit from within. We wish one another blessings; He gives blessings. He alone can plant in a heart, by His divine husbandry, the seed that will blossom into a 'new creature in Christ.

In the circuits of the planets there are times when the heavens are under the earth, and in the ways of God with men there was a time when Heaven was under the earth, and that was when Christ was born in the cave of Bethlehem.

An unsuffering Christ Who did not freely pay the debt of human guilt would be reduced to the level of an ethical guide;

The soul that hated truth (to speak in inadequate human terms) would suffer more in heaven than in hell; analogically speaking, the want of the Spirit of Christ makes us shrink from His companionship.

The fall of the priest is completed by these steps: neglect of prayer, withdrawal to a distance from the Eucharistic Lord, dedication to a comfortable existence, negligence concerning occasions of sin and, finally, the substitution of a creature for Christ.

The lazy priest always has less time than the zealous priest, because the former is thinking in terms of the interruptions to his leisure, while the latter seeks the opportunity to be another Christ. The priest's time is not his own; it is Our Lord's.

Christ does not come off with the chasuble, nor is our ordination folded in a pocket as easily as a stole. Unbelievers do not see us in vestments; they see us in shops, in theatres, at meetings. Whether they see Christ in us depends on whether we act like Christ.

Satan may appear in many disguises like Christ, and at the end of the world will appear as a benefactor and philanthropist—but Satan never has and never will appear with scars.