Existential anxiety of doubt drives the person toward the creation of certitude of systems of meaning, which are supported by tradition and authority. Neurotic anxiety builds a narrow castle of certitude which can be defended with the utmost certainty.

Grace strikes us when we are in great pain ....Sometimes at that moment a wave of light breaks into our darkness, and it is as though a voice were saying, 'You are accepted.'

Theology moves back and forth between two poles, the eternal truth of its foundations and the temporal situation in which the eternal truth must be received.

The courage to be is rooted in the God who appears when God has disappeared in the anxiety of doubt.

The vitality that can stand the abyss of meaninglessness is aware of a hidden meaning within the destruction of meaning.

Wisdom loves the children of men, but she prefers those who come through foolishness to wisdom.

The citizens of a city are not guilty of the crimes committed in their city; but they are guilty as participants in the destiny of [humanity] as a whole and in the destiny of their city in particular; for their acts in which freedom was united with destiny have contributed to the destiny in which they participate. They are guilty, not of committing the crimes of which their group is accused, but of contributing to the destiny in which these crimes happened.