Quotes About Church

There's no possibility for vitality in the church without fidelity to the gospels. If you look at the Churches throughout the world, throughout the Western world, where radical reform has been attempted, the Church has collapsed and almost disappeared. The vitality in the Church, the young people who are here in their tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands possibly, young people who belong, who adhere strongly to the central tradition of Christ and the Church.

Let us pray for the Catholic Church; for the Churches throughout the whole world; that is, for their truth, unity, and stability; that in all charity may flourish, and truth may live. For our own Church, that what is lacking in it may be supplied; what is unsound, corrected; that all Heresies, Schisms, Scandals, as well public as private, may be removed. Correct the wandering, convert the unbelieving, increase the faith of the Church, destroy Heresies, discover the crafty enemies, crush the violent.

I would like a more missionary church,Not so much a tranquil church, but a beautiful church that goes forward.

On day one, the Church wasn't for church people because there weren't any church people.

It's all so verbal in the Protestant church. You've heard these words a million times before. Maybe people are leaving the church because they find the church has nothing that they're looking for.

Turning against the church I also had to turn against a lot of the teachings of people in my family who were very much of the church and caught in it, and every time I turned to find where resides the good in the church, all I saw was the demonic, the Lucifer of the journey.

The Reformed Church was identified with the old all-white government of South Africa and its apartheid policy. The Roman Catholic Church was closely identified with the Franco and Salazar dictatorships in Spain and Portugal. . . . More recently, . . . the Serbian Orthodox Church has come to be identified with the policies of Serbia (Yugoslavia).

Only the [Catholic] Church stood squarely across the path of Hitler’s campaign for suppressing truth. I never had any special interest in the Church before, but now I feel a great affection and admiration because the Church alone has had the courage and persistence to stand for intellectual truth and moral freedom. I am forced thus to confess that what I once despised I now praise unreservedly.

To be connected with the church is to be associated with scoundrels, warmongers, fakes, child-molesters, murderers, adulterers, and hypocrites of every description. It also, at the same time, identifies you with saints and the finest persons of heroic soul within every time, country, race, and gender. To be a member of the church is to carry the mantle of both the worst sin and the finest heroism of soul . . . because the church always looks exactly as it looked at the original crucifixion, God hung among thieves.

The adoration of Jesus in the Most Blessed Sacrament is the end of the Church Militant, just as adoration of God in His glory is the end of the Church Triumphant. A holy rivalry, a concert of prayer, a harmony of divine service should exist between the heavenly court and the Eucharistic court here below, between the adorer and his mother the Church.

There are a still lot of people in today's church who can easily identify the idolatry outside the church and are pretty proud of the fact that they are not like them. And yet, we are far too slow to recognize the idolatry inside the church and more painfully, the idolatry inside our hearts.

If we all gave all our goods to the poor, the church would fall apart. If we all hated our father and mother, as Jesus told us to, there'd be an end of the church's emphasis on the family as being the one important thing holding the whole society together. There are all sorts of ways in which the church's teachings contradict directly what Jesus says in the Gospel.

Barna is correct when he writes, "After fifteen years of diligent digging into the world around me, I have reached several conclusions about the future of the Christian church in America. The central conclusion is that the American church is dying due to lack of strong spiritual leadership. In this time of unprecedented opportunity and plentiful resources, the church is actually losing influence. The primary reason is the lack of leadership. Nothing is more important than leadership."7

My grandmother went to church, but my mother had been inundated with church and decided that when she had children, she would not push church or God on her children.

The Church is always in trouble because the Church walks into the trouble in which mankind is trying to resolve itself. There are a lot of areas that need to be addressed. If we were perfect we wouldn't be the Church. I think it's the imperfections that allow people to trust that you're working (toward) something.

Before my grandpa built his own church, we went to the neighboring town, and it was a white community. You know, up north, mostly middle European people and Indians, Chippewa Indians. We were welcome to that church, but once we got in, they didn't know what to do with us.

The true church is not made of creeds and forms, nor is it contained in walls of wood and stone; the heart of man is its temple and the Spirit of truth is the one guide into all Truth. When men learn to turn within to the Spirit of truth, who is in each one for his light and inspiration, the differences between the churches of man will be eliminated, and the one church will be recognized.

Church is great, but I found my church here. Hugh Hefner has been nothing but a gentleman.

I condemn Christianity; I bring against the Christian Church the most terrible of all accusations that an accuser has ever had in his mouth. It is, to me, the greatest of all imaginable corruptions; it seeks to work the ultimate corruption, the worse possible corruption. The Christian Church has left nothing untouched by its depravity; it has turned every value into worthlessness, and every truth into a lie, and every integrity into baseness of soul.

The Roman Catholic Church is for saints and sinners alone - for respectable people, the Anglican Church will do.

I sat on the piano bench next to my mother in church. Something happened before I set foot on this planet. I was crawling around inside of her. She was a church pianist. My dad was a brilliant singer. I was hearing it.

It should be recognized that this Church is not a social club. This is the kingdom of God on the earth. It is the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints. Its purpose is to bring salvation and exaltation to both the living and the dead.

I still love church. My favorite church service is T.D. Jakes at the Potter's House. I don't think there is a better preacher in the country. His ability to interpret scripture is like no other.

We know what hair smells like when a hot comb hits it. That's a cultural thing. We know what that smells like on Sunday mornings, usually church-related or something. In my house, it was getting ready for church and your sister was getting her hair fried.

When we decided to marry, we had two ceremonies - one was more bureaucratic for the sake of the Swiss authorities,then a church service in Florence, and I wrote the music for the church service. The challenge in that was that Iman's [Abdulmajid] family are Muslim and mine are Protestant. I had to be careful about the prayers that we chose and the music I wrote because I didn't want to offend either side.

Nothing in the church makes people in the church more angry than grace. It's ironic: we stumble into a party we weren't invited to and find the uninvited standing at the door making sure no other uninviteds get in. Then a strange phenomenon occurs: as soon as we are included in the party because of Jesus' irresponsible love, we decide to make grace "more responsible" by becoming self-appointed Kingdom Monitors, guarding the kingdom of God, keeping the riffraff out (which, as I understand it, are who the kingdom of God is supposed to include).

At stake are two different visions of faith, the Church of Caesar, powerful and rich; and the Church of Christ - loving, poor and spiritually rich.

I am not a spokesperson for the church and the church is not a spokesperson for the United States of America.

I have always felt that my work is religious, not sacrilegious. I would say that there are many individuals in the Church who appreciate it and who do not have a problem with it. The best place for Piss Christ is in a church.

Certain things happened in the early church. Women who had never had any freedom suddenly have the ability to stand up and speak and be treated as equals within the life of the church.

I could hear rain still pouring from the gutters and a thin branch scraping against one of the windows; but the church seemed completely cut off from the restless day outside--just as I felt cut off from the church. I thought: I am a restlessness inside a stillness inside a restlessness.

I grew up in the church and had religion in my life for a long time. I'm not really a church goer, but I definitely have a hunger for a spiritual connection to the world and for my soul to be healed.

Churchgoers all across the nation say the Holy Spirit has entered them. They claim that God has given them a supernatural ability to follow Christ, put their sin to death, and serve the church. Christians talk about being born again say that they they were dead but now have come to life. We have become hardened to those words, but they are powerful words that have significant meaning. Yet when those outside the church see no difference in our lives, they begin to question our integrity, out sanity, or even worse, our God. And can you blame them?

One thing and one thing alone keeps us from complete decay in this hour - the church, the true Church.

The work of the Spirit is the bringing to be of the vision of God....the capacitating of persons to 'see visions' and 'dream dreams'. .... The birth of the Church is the beginning of the End. ..... The Kingdom of God as the miracle of ocular newness when 'the blind see' makes its impact on history in the creation of a visionary community . [[The tongues were]] the language of the world to come... Therefore in this birth of the Church, the risen and ascended Lord takes to himself a Body on earth with eyes opened by the Spirit to see the future.

I lived in Meadowbrook. I went to church at Meadowbrook United Methodist Church. I went to school at Meadowbrook Elementary School and then Meadowbrook Middle School. I learned to dance at Meadowbrook Country Club. All those things grounded me in one place and I think most of Fort Worth is just like the area I grew up in.

Like all soul singers, I grew up singing in church but sometimes I would leave early and sit in the car listening to gospel band, The Blind Boys of Alabama. Hearing their lead singer Clarence made me connect the idea of church and show business and see how I could make a career singing music that stirred the soul.

When I walk up the piazza of Santa Croce I feel as if it were not a Florentine nor an European church but a church built by and for the human race.

The fact is that there is a profound spiritual hunger in the western world which, for a variety of reasons, its church is no longer able to assuage. So a book which suggests that there is a spiritual significance to the Christian story but that this has been suppressed by the church undoubtedly appeals to those who are anxious to square this circle.

The last word of our Lord to the church was not the Great Commission. The last thing He said to the church was 'Repent.' He said that to five out of seven.

The Church must never be satisfied with the ranks of those whom she has reached at a certain point or say that others are fine as they are: Muslims, Hindus and so forth. The Church can never retreat comfortably to within the limits of her own environment. She is charged with universal solicitude; she must be concerned with and for one and all... We must... as the Lord says - go out ever anew 'to the highways and hedges' (Luke 14:23), to deliver God's invitation to his banquet also to those who have so far heard nothing or have not been stirred within.

It is a blessed thing that in every age some one has had individuality enough and courage enough to stand by his own convictions, -- some one who had the grandeur to say his say. I believe it was Magellan who said, The church says the earth is flat; but I have seen its shadow on the moon, and I have more confidence even in a shadow than in the church. On the prow of his ship were disobedience, defiance, scorn, and success.

Some say they are not bound by the doctrine which teaches that the Mystical Body of Christ and the Roman Catholic Church are one and the same thing. Some reduce to a meaningless formula the necessity of belonging to the true Church in order to gain eternal salvation. Others finally belittle the reasonable character of the credibility of Christian Faith. These and like errors, it is clear, have crept in among certain of our sons who are deceived by imprudent zeal for souls or by false science.

I was immersed in comfortable Christianity. Years ago, I found myself living what seemed like the American church dream - pastoring a large church, living in a large house, and surrounded by all the comforts this world has to offer. But inside I had a sinking feeling that I was missing the point.

The church is not the way to heaven; the church is the sign that points to heaven.

Jesus never says to the poor: ‘come find the church’, but he says to those of us in the church: ‘go into the world and find the poor, hungry, homeless, imprisoned.

Worship is more than music. It’s about these moments we have together as a family, as the church, and a good testimony can be a part of that. Prayer, preaching, the Word of God… these are all things that can be powerful elements as we plan a worship service. And ultimately, you want people leaving your church saying, ‘It was good to have been in the house of the Lord.

We cannot be content with an evangelism which does not lead to the drawing of converts into the church, nor with a church order whose principle of cohesion is a superficial social camaraderie instead of a spiritual fellowship with the Father and with his Son, Jesus Christ.