John Shelby Spong Quotes

What the mind cannot accept, the heart can finally never adore.

John Shelby Spong

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John Shelby Spong

John Shelby "Jack" Spong (June 16, 1931 – September 12, 2021) was an American bishop of the Episcopal Church. From 1979 to 2000, he was the Bishop of Newark, New Jersey. A liberal Christian theologian, religion commentator, and author, he called for a fundamental rethinking of Christian belief away from theism and traditional doctrines.

Source: Wikipedia

John Shelby Spong

What the mind cannot accept, the heart can finally never adore.

mind heart theology accept christian
John Shelby Spong

Whatever it was that people experience in Jesus has today come to be identified with medieval doctrines based on premodern assumptions that are no longer believable. That identification means that serious theological discussion seems to accomplish little more than to erect a division between the shouters and the disinterested. Jesus becomes the captive of the hysterically religious, the chronically fearful, the insecure and even the neurotic among us, or he becomes little more than a fading memory, the symbol of an age that is no more and a nostalgic reminder of our believing past. To me neither option is worth pursuing. Yet even understanding these things, I am still attracted to this Jesus and I will pursue him both relentlessly and passionately. I will not surrender the truth I believe I find in him either to those who seek to defend the indefensible or to those who want to be freed finally from premodern ideas that no longer make any sense.

jesus
John Shelby Spong

I think that anything that begins to give people a sense of their own worth and dignity is God.

worth people
John Shelby Spong

If you begin to give people hope that there is a brighter future, there is a new tomorrow, then the people who were yesterday's terrorists become tomorrow's elected officials and they're part of the system.

people system
John Shelby Spong

Terrorism is a real despair. These are people for whom life has been so negative that they're willing to die if they can take down some of their enemies.

life enemies people
John Shelby Spong

You can't have a world where 50 percent of the people are dieting and 50 percent of the people are starving if you want stability.

people
John Shelby Spong

I learned early in life that you get places by having the right enemies.

rights places life enemies
John Shelby Spong

Whatever diminishes life is evil, and whatever enhances life is good.

life
John Shelby Spong

All religion seems to need to prove that it's the only truth. And that's where it turns demonic. Because that's when you get religious wars and persecutions and burning heretics at the stake.

persecution truth war religion
John Shelby Spong

I admire our ancestors, whoever they were. I think the first self-conscious person must have shaken in his boots. Because as he becomes self-conscious, he's no longer part of nature. He sees himself against nature. He looks at the vastness of the universe and it looks hostile.

nature self
John Shelby Spong

Mother Nature is not sweet.

nature
John Shelby Spong

You learn that you either are going to have a police state where you don't have any freedom left, or you're going to build a world that doesn't create terrorists - and that means a whole different way of getting along.

buildup

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