Tony Campolo Quotes

Religion flourishes in greater purity, without than with the aid of Government.

But separation of church and state was never meant to separate God and government.

The forefathers, including James Madison, felt very strongly that the duties that we owe to God were outside of government's prerogative, that government had no business interfering with the way we worship God.

The balance between faith and reason is for the determination of each individual, and of the people as a whole, not of unauthorized government officials uttering impious humbug as they arbitrarily try to define that balance.

Nothing is more dreaded than the national government meddling with religion.

God handed his word to Moses. He didn't need the Tennessee General Assembly's help.

A religion that has a personal God, outside of humanity, to worship and to please, is quite apt to get appointed an official to regulate the people, and particularly to execute punishment adequate to the offense committed against an Infinite Ruler of the universe.

Intrude not yourself into ecclesiastical matters.

I think its rather peculiar. It's not in keeping with our founding documents, our founding vision. But I'd guess you'd have to ask the Obama administration why they purged all this language from their platform. There sure is a lot of mention of government, so I guess I would put the onus on them to answer why they did all these purges of God.

Same-sex marriage is not the final nail in the coffin for traditional marriage. It is just another road sign toward the substitution of government for God. Every moral discussion now pits the wisest moral arbiters among us - the Supreme Court, President Obama - against traditional religion.

I'm a pastor. I say, 'Let the church say amen,' and that settles it. Everything has been said, you know; it's like we have to agree with God.

A nation that honors God will always be honored by God. I've seen nations that have dishonored God: God has been taken out of schools, the government, the military; and when you take Him out of a nation, how can you expect God to protect this nation?

I don't believe there is a separation of church and state. I think the Constitution is very clear. The only separation is that there will not be a government church.

And I don't think that government has a role in telling people how to live their lives. Maybe a minister does, maybe your belief in God does, maybe there's another set of moral codes, but I don't think government has a role.

While we have a Constitution that is very strong in the sense that we are not gonna have a religion that's sanctioned by the government, it doesn't mean that we need to have a separation between government and religion.

Does God feel like that same-sex marriage could happen? I don't think anybody who has a connection to God and God's understanding and depth of compassion who's gonna say 'no.'

Not every religion has to have St. Augustine's attitude to sex. Why even in our culture marriages are celebrated in a church, everyone present knows what is going to happen that night, but that doesn't prevent it being a religious ceremony.

Nor marry to unbelievers until they believe.

When the government says to you that they want to help you be more religious, you want to run away from them as fast as possible.

How hurtful to religion and the state is the concession to ministers of religion of any power of issuing decrees or transacting the business of government.

To arrive at the truth in all things, we ought always to be ready to believe that what seems to us white is black if the hierarchical Church so defines it.

It is neither sacrilegious or antireligious to say that each separate government should stay out of the business of writing or sanctioning official prayers and leave that purely religious function to the people themselves and to those the people choose to look to for religious guidance.

As God is the only worthy object of all religious worship, and nothing can be true religion but a voluntary obedience unto His revealed will … every person has an unalienable right to act in all religious affairs according to the full persuasion of his own mind, where others are not injured thereby …

God's institutions (such as the government of church and of commonwealth be) may be close and compact, and co-ordinate one to another, and yet not confounded.

Is it the duty of a deist to support that which he believes to be a cheat and imposition? Is it the duty of the Jew to support the religion of Jesus Christ, when he really believes that he was an imposter? Must the papist be forced to pay men for preaching down the supremacy of the pope, whom they are sure is the head of the church? Government has no more to do with the religious opinions of men than it has with the principles of mathematics