Hans Kung Quotes

Canonization in modern times is a very, almost scientific process.

I think, internally, we Catholics have known this for a long time. I think we're just thrilled and grateful that the rest of the world now is sharing in the esteem and gratitude that we've had for Pope John Paul II for 26 and a half years.

How anyone can remain a Catholic - I mean who has ever been aroused to think, and is not biased by the partialities of childish years - after seeing Catholicism here in Italy I cannot conceive.

Vatican II and the Space/Information Age began in the same eye blink of history, with John XXIII's opening speech of Vatican II on Oct. 11, 1962, following John F. Kennedy's call for a round trip to the moon a month earlier.

His head was boiled, impaled upon a pole and raised above London Bridge. So ended the life of Thomas More, one of the few Londoners upon whom sainthood has been conferred and the first English layman to be beatified as a martyr.

The men of moral and religious earnestness were bent on some measure of fresh reform. A spirit was abroad which could not be put down, and which would not be quiet. The old idea of an authoritative Church was outgrown, and yet no religious system had come in its place which provided for a free personal approach to God Himself.

As the true magnitude of the witch problem became more apparent, the Church enlisted the Inquisition, an applied institution specifically designed to address pressing social concerns. The Inquisition became the growth industry of the day, offering exciting work, rapid advancement, and wide recognition to its professional and technical workers. Its creative and energetic efforts to create a witch-free world unearthed dangers in the most unlikely places; the rates of witch identification, assessment and evaluation soared.

I am not today, nor have I ever been a Jew, and as a matter of fact, I am uncircumcised.

It is hard for many people today to make the distinction between religion and religiosity, the latter a dangerous parody of the former.

The institutions of Churchianity are not Christianity. An institution is a good thing if it is second; immediately an institution recognizes itself it becomes the dominating factor.

Obviously, the 'Glow' show is a real feminist story. I knew it would be about female empowerment, and that was really exciting to me. Having some distance on a period show, I think you can really delve into those kinds of political topics in an in-depth way, and a lot of that reverberates today.

Catholicism has changed tremendously in recent years. Now when Communion is served there is also a salad bar.

The Bible, as we know it today, was collated by the pagan Roman Emperor Constantine the Great

Sometimes people have said that Islam, in its own calendar, is still only in the Middle Ages.

The last person to be beatified by Pope John Paul II was Mother Teresa of Calcutta in 2003.

It is safest to grasp the concept of the postmodern as an attempt to think the present historically in an age that has forgotten how to think historically in the first place.

In the Middle Ages, everything bad was the work of the devil, everything good, the work of God. Today, the French see everything in reverse and blame the Germans for it.

Today I think that if for no other reason than that an Auschwitz existed, no one in our age should speak of Providence.

I wouldn't have known anything about Catholicism if I hadn't been dating Gert. In those days, Catholics were much less ecumenical than they are today. Gert was always of the mind that she wouldn't go to another church except the Catholic Church. So when I would date her in New York City and later when we went to Oxford before we got married we always went to the Catholic church.

I think most people, if I asked, would say, "Yes, of course I believe." But I think for a great many of them it doesn't really make much difference in terms of either what they do with their lives or with their own inner well-being. They believe because so did grandfather, and that's the same church they've been going to all these years.

The pope has been called many things, historic figure, spiritual leader, moral force. But a growing chorus of voices has begun to refer to him as John Paul II the Great, in other words, as a saint.

There are many photos of Eisenstein. I think he was quite vain, and he liked photos of him. Being a virgin at 33 is strange now, but let's not be too high-minded about that.

This is how you know religion is failing because people think you're bonkers if you believe in God and also because it's so uncool believing in Jesus and everything.

To think historically is almost the same thing now as if in all ages history had been made according to theory.

Pope John Paul II is the great. Only two other popes had that title. Does that suggest there is going to be a move for canonization?