Hans Urs von Balthasar Quotes

The church has an unconditional obligation to the victims of any ordering society, even if they do not belong to the Christian community.

When absolute control and rigid obedience pose as love within the family and the local faith-community , we produce trained cowards rather than Christian persons.

Will not the very moment of great disillusionment with my brother or sister be incomparably wholesome for me becuase it so thoroughly teaches me that both of us can never live by our own words and deeds, but only by that one Word and deed that really binds us together, the forgiveness of sins in Jesus Christ? The bright day of Christian community dawns wherever the early morning mists of dreamy visions are lifting

The natural world around us shows the way to relief. All of life is maintained by the sun, by the air, by water, by the earth and its resources. And to whom was the sun given? To everyone. If there is any one thing that people do have in common, it is the gift of sunlight. But as the early Christians said, "If the sun were not hung so high, someone would have claimed it long ago."

I no longer represent any organized religion. I'm not Catholic. I'm not Christian. I'm saying this because I have to be an outsider for Christ.

As Christians we’re called to belong, not just to believe. We are not meant to live lone-ranger lives; instead, we are to belong to Christ’s family and be members of his body.

The Protestant reformation was an attempt to recast the Christian faith in terms of the new learning of the 16th century, the enlightenment learning. It was the first time that the Christian church did not have the capacity to keep itself unified as it recast itself, so it split into Protestant and Catholic traditions.

Many of my ardent admirers would be roundly shocked and disturbed if they realized that everything I believe is thoroughly moral, thoroughly Catholic, and that it is these beliefs that give my work its chief characteristics.

In a volunteer organization there has to be time for community.

Every Christian community must realize that not only do the weak need the strong, but also that the strong cannot exist without the weak. The elimination of the weak is the death of fellowship.

The certain mark by which a Christian community can be recognized is the preaching of the gospel in its purity.

It is in struggle and service with our brothers and sisters, individually and collectively, that we find the meaning of life.

As soon as a man has found Christ, he begins to find others.

God is love, and that love works through men-especially through the whole community of Christians.

Each individual Christian and every community is called to be an instrument of God for the liberation and promotion of the poor.

The distinctive mark of the Christian, today more than ever, must be love for the poor, the weak, the suffering.

How beautiful is the family that recites the Rosary every evening.

Christian society is like a bundle of sticks laid together, whereof one kindles another. Solitary men have fewest provocations to evil, but, again, fewest incitations to good. So much as doing good is better than not doing evil will I account Christian good-fellowship better than an hermitish and melancholy solitariness.

When I walked into the Christian section of a bookstore, the message was clear: Faith is something you do alone. Rick does not have much tolerance for people living alone. He's like Bill Clinton in that he feels everyone's pain. If Rick thinks somebody is lonely, he can't sleep at night. He wants us all to live with each other and play nice so he can get some rest. Tortured soul.

The early Christians felt a deep collision with the empire in which they lived, and with politics as usual. They carelessly crossed party lines and built subversive friendships. And we should do that too.

We're also remembering the guiding light of our Judeo-Christian tradition. All of us here today are descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, sons and daughters of the same God. I believe we are bound by faith in our God, by our love for family and neighborhood, by our deep desire for a more peaceful world, and by our commitment to protect the freedom which is our legacy as Americans. These values have given a renewed sense of worth to our lives. They are infusing America with confidence and optimism that many thought we had lost.

Late one night our house was attacked with stones and bricks by five or six young Christians, and my father got very upset and frightened. Well, the next day he dropped dead of a heart attack. The community knew very well that he had a heart condition, so I lay a murder to the city of Baltimore.

Christians are like the several flowers in a garden that have each of them the dew of heaven, which, being shaken with the wind, they let fall at each other's roots, whereby they are jointly nourished, and become nourishers of each other.

I was raised Catholic and now I am a Christian and follow of the Lord Jesus Christ. I made the change because the Holy Spirit revealed a truth to me.

I'm Catholic, and my wife is Catholic. We're very religious. We go to church. We pray every night. We pray at dinner. To me, Catholics regard themselves as very Christian. Some Christians view Catholics as not necessarily Christian.