Happiness is not mostly pleasure, it is mostly victory.
One of the strange phenomena of the last century is the spectacle of religion dropping the appeal of fear while other human interests have picked it up.
All intelligent faith in God has behind it a background of humble agnosticism.
The stars are not so strange as the mind that studies them, analyzes their light, and measures their distance.
Religion is something that only secondarily can be taught. It must must primarily be taught.
The process has now run full circle: Preaching originates in personal counseling; preaching is personal counseling on a group basis; personal counseling originates in preaching. Personal counseling imparts to the preacher a practical familiarity with human nature which he would not otherwise obtain.
Self-pity gets you nowhere. But insight to see that something can be done with the second-bests and adventurous daring to try might be a handle to take hold of.
I renounce war for its consequences, for the lies it lives on and propagates, for the undying hatred it arouses, for the dictatorships it puts in place of democracy, for the starvation that stalks after it. I renounce war, and never again, directly or indirectly, will I sanction or support another.
Religion is not a burden, not a weight, it is wings.
Whatever you laugh at in others, laughs at yourself.
Every failure can be considered as a tragedy or a chance to learn something. The latter is healthier.
Atheism is a theoretical formulation of the discouraged life...
I hate war for its consequences, for the lies it lives on and propagates, for the undying hatreds it arouses...
The fact that astronomies change while the stars abide is a true analogy of every realm of human life and thought, religion not least of all. No existent theology can be a final formulation of spiritual truth.
Our power is not so much in us as through us.
He is a poor patriot whose patriotism does not enable him to understand how all men everywhere feel about their altars and their hearthstones, their flag and their fatherland.
The first question to be answered by any individual or any social group, facing a hazardous situation, is whether the crisis is to be met as a challenge to strength or as an occasion for despair.
Life asks not merely what you can do; it asks how much can you endure and not be spoiled.
A good sermon is an engineering operation by which a chasm is bridged so that the spiritual goods on one side-the ‘unsearchable riches of Christ’ – are actually transported into personal lives upon the other.
We cannot all be great, but we can always attach ourselves to something that is great.