The separation of church and state is necessary partly because if religion is good then the state shouldn't interfere with the religious vision or with the religious prophet.
Reinhold NiebuhrThe chief source of man's inhumanity to man seems to be the tribal limits of his sense of obligation to other men.
Reinhold NiebuhrUltimately freedom is necessary for a society, because every despotic society - for instance, the Russian society - lives on the basis of a rather implausible dogma - the Marxist dogma of world redemption through Communism.
Reinhold NiebuhrThe society in which each man lives is at once the basis for, and the nemesis of, that fulness of life which each man seeks.
Reinhold NiebuhrLiberalism makes this mistake in regard to private property and Marxism makes it in regard to socialized property... The Marxist illusion is partly derived from a romantic conception of human nature... It assumes that the socialization of property will eliminate human egotism... The development of a managerial class in Russia, combing economic with political power, is an historic refutation of the Marxist theory.
Reinhold Niebuhr