Every experience proves that the real problem of our existence lies in the fact that we ought to love one another, but do not.
Reinhold NiebuhrNow the ordinary Protestant, Jew or Secularist has a stereotype about Catholicism. It consists of Spanish Catholicism, Latin-American Catholicism and, let us say, a Catholicism of O'Connor's "Great Hurrah." Now there are types of Catholicism like that but this doesn't - this doesn't do justice to the genuine relation that Catholicism has had to Democratic Society.
Reinhold NiebuhrIt is the evil in man that makes democracy necessary, and man's belief in justice that makes democracy possible.
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