Feast of Thomas Aquinas, Priest, Teacher of the Faith, 1274 This Christian claim [of universal validity] is naturally offensive read more

Feast of Thomas Aquinas, Priest, Teacher of the Faith, 1274 This Christian claim [of universal validity] is naturally offensive to the adherents of every other religious system. It is almost as offensive to modern man, brought up in the atmosphere of relativism, in which tolerance is regarded almost as the highest of the virtues. But we must not suppose that this claim to universal validity is something that can quietly be removed from the Gospel without changing it into something entirely different from what it is... Jesus' life, his method, and his message do not make sense, unless they are interpreted in the light of his own conviction that he was in fact the final and decisive word of God to men... For the human sickness there is one specific remedy, and this is it. There is no other.

Feast of Agnes, Child Martyr at Rome, 304 Most Christians are affected far more than they know by the read more

Feast of Agnes, Child Martyr at Rome, 304 Most Christians are affected far more than they know by the standards and methods of the surrounding world. In these days when power and size and speed are almost universally admired, it seems to me particularly important to study afresh the "weakness", the "smallness of entry", and the "slowness" of God as He begins His vast work of reconstructing His disordered world. We are all tempted to take short cuts, to work for quick results, and to evade painful sacrifice. It is therefore essential that we should look again at love incarnate in a human being, to see God Himself at work within the limitations of human personality, and to base our methods on what we see Him do.

Commemoration of John & Henry Venn, Priests, Evangelical Divines, 1813, 1873 Here [in the Gospels] is something that read more

Commemoration of John & Henry Venn, Priests, Evangelical Divines, 1813, 1873 Here [in the Gospels] is something that the layman can hold on to, quite apart from the vagaries of critical scholarship, for it is a portrait unaffected by the authenticity of any particular saying or story. Such an encounter with the historical Jesus is, of course, not the same as Christian faith in him. Even Caiaphas, Herod, and Pontius Pilate encountered him in this way. Christian faith is still a matter of decision -- either this Man is God's redemptive act, or he is not. Nor is the historical Jesus the object of our faith. That object is the Risen Christ preached by the Church. But the Risen Christ is in continuity with the historical Jesus, and it is the historical Jesus which makes the Risen Christ not just an abstraction, but clothes him with flesh and blood.

He enters by the door who enters by Christ, who imitates the suffering of Christ, who is acquainted with the read more

He enters by the door who enters by Christ, who imitates the suffering of Christ, who is acquainted with the humility of Christ so as to feel and know that, if God became man for us, men should not think themselves God, but men. He who, being man, wishes to appear God, does not imitate Him who, being God, became man. Thou art not bid to think less of thyself than thou art, but to know what thou art.

The world, indeed, seems to be weary of the just, righteous, holy ways of God, and of that exactness in read more

The world, indeed, seems to be weary of the just, righteous, holy ways of God, and of that exactness in walking according to His institutions and commands which it will be one day known that He doth require. But the way to put a stop to this declension is not by accommodating the commands of God to the corrupt courses and ways of men. The truths of God and the holiness of His precepts must be pleaded and defended, though the world dislike them here and perish hereafter. His law must not be made to lackey after the wills of men, nor be dissolved by vain interpretations, because they complain they cannot -- indeed, because they will not -- comply with it. Our Lord Jesus Christ came not to destroy the law and the prophets, but to fulfill them, and to supply men with spiritual strength to fulfill them also. It is evil to break the least commandment; but there is a great aggravation of that evil in them that shall teach men so to do.

The evangelical... wants such peace as men can attain to have some kind of relationship to justice. He observes many read more

The evangelical... wants such peace as men can attain to have some kind of relationship to justice. He observes many different kinds of peace prevailing in the world he inhabits. Not all of them are good. For example, there is the peace that death brings, the peace of the tomb. Today it could be called the peace of Auschwitz. Hitler tried to "make peace" with the Jews by seeking their "final solution"; but the evangelical would fight rather than submit to such a peace. There is also the peace of slavery and subjection, the Pax Romana. Dictators are very fond of the Roman peace. Today it could be called the peace of Tibet. The nation of Tibet has been completely stripped of its personality in our generation by Communist China without a single protest being made in front of a single embassy. Again, there is peace that is artificially induced in men. Among individuals it is the peace of the tranquilizer, the peace of withdrawal and schizophrenia, the peace of the brain-washed prisoner. Should large-scale chemical warfare break our, we are told, whole cities could be sprayed and pacified by such drugs. The evangelical is not interested in paying such high prices for the sake of peace. He would rather stay free, and alive, and in his right mind, prepared to fight.

In an authority so high [as Scripture], admit but one officious lie, and there will not remain a single passage read more

In an authority so high [as Scripture], admit but one officious lie, and there will not remain a single passage of those apparently difficult to practice or to believe, which on the same most pernicious rule may not be explained as a lie uttered by the author willfully to serve a purpose.

Feast of Oswald, King of Northumbria, Martyr, 642 We do not very often come across opportunities for exercising strength, read more

Feast of Oswald, King of Northumbria, Martyr, 642 We do not very often come across opportunities for exercising strength, magnanimity, or magnificence; but gentleness, temperance, modesty, and humility, are graces which ought to color everything we do. There may be virtues of a more exalted mold, but... these are the most continually called for in daily life.

Commemoration of Brigid, Abbess of Kildare, c.525 We distrust the providence of God when, after we have used read more

Commemoration of Brigid, Abbess of Kildare, c.525 We distrust the providence of God when, after we have used all our best endeavors and begged His blessing upon them, we torment ourselves about the wise issue and event of them.