For all their engagement with civil society, then, most Christians support it fundamentally as an addendum, an “alien work” whose reality does not internally flower from the logic of their own existence, either as citizens or as believers. . . . They practically admit civic life’s importance, but cannot fully explain its import in a satisfactorily theological manner.
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Miguel de Unamuno
Those who believe they believe in God, but without passion in the heart, without anguish of mind, without uncertainty, without doubt and even at times without despair, believe only in the idea of God, not in God himself. — Miguel de Unamuno
Kenneth Leech
If Christian worship had revolved around feet-washing instead of bread-sharing, it is intriguing and depressing to think that now we would be involved in theological disputes about whether the feet should be sprinkled or totally immersed, whether the right or left feet should come first, who was authorized to wash feet, whether women’s feet could be washed, and, even more serious, whether women could wash feet! — Kenneth Leech
Kenneth Leech
The theme of good news for the poor, the anawim, the little people, is crucial to Christianity. . . . So the test of spirituality is a practical test, and particularly the test of attitude to the poor. — Kenneth Leech
Vincent Harding
The question of “race is like a bone stuck in our throat, refusing both digestion and explusion, endangering our life.” It is “the unmistakable need and desire of our nation to deal with its terrifying and compelling history, to exorcise the demons of our racial past and present, perhaps even to discover the healing possibilities that reside in our many-hued and wounded variations on the human theme.” — Vincent Harding
Vincent Harding
For it is likely that there can be no resurrections by proxy. Each person and each generation may be called to stand anew—but not alone—at the river. — Vincent Harding
Vincent Harding
Is it really possible that certain kinds of power come to us only as we let go of things rather than accumulate them? — Vincent Harding
W.E.B. Du Bois
This is a beautiful world; this is a wonderful America, which the founding fathers dreamed until their sons drowned it in the blood of slavery and devoured it in greed. Our children must rebuild it. — W.E.B. Du Bois
David O. Woodyard
The cross is about more than Jesus; the depth of meaning in the cross is that we have a wounded God. God did not take a pass on Golgotha. . . . When the sacraments are defined by the God on the cross, they constitute resistance to empire and the assurance of God prevailing. . . . It is the cross that keeps the Eucharist from being a pacifier for the future and a peace-engendering moment. — David O. Woodyard
David O. Woodyard
Conservatives have traditionally reduced [the “born again” text of John 3:16] to, “Have you found Jesus?” The individual is set apart and privatized. [Frederic K.] Herzog centers on “Have you found your neighbor?” . . . To be born again is to enter into a relationship with oneself, one that is corporate and in solidarity with others, especially the powerless and poor.