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Quote by Reinhold Niebuhr

“I think that the Christian faith is right as against simple forms of secularism. That it believes that there is in man a radical freedom, and this freedom is creative but it is also destructive. And there's nothing that prevents this from being both creative and destructive.”

Quote by Reinhold Niebuhr

Author

Reinhold Niebuhr

Reinhold Niebuhr was a prominent American theologian whose work on Christian ethics and social ethics had a profound impact on the 20th century. He was a key figure in theological discourse, particularly for his exploration of the nature of sin and the church's role in society. Niebuhr's theological thought has influenced various Christian denominations and has had a lasting effect on political and social thought. more

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“That's why history is not an answer to our problem, because history complicates, enlarges every problem of human existence. Now, the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries didn't believe this.”

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“Now we're living in a nuclear age, and the science that was supposed to be automatically for human welfare has become a nuclear - a science that gives us nuclear weapons. This is the ironic character of human history, and of human existence, which I can only explain, if I say so, in Biblical terms. Now I don't mean by this reason that I will accept every interpretation of Christianity that's derived from the Bible as many people wouldn't accept my interpretation. But that's what it means for me.”

“I think there is and ultimate answer in a true religious faith, but it doesn't give you any immediate answers, it doesn't.”

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“You can't say that religion or irreligion will give us a particular answer to the nuclear dilemma.”

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“I think I have one answer, that is partly religious and partly secular; and that is to say, we ought to at least recognize that we and the Russians are in a common predicament. That would be religious in the sense, "Judge not lest you be judged."”

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“We judge the Russians because they're living under despotism and we don't like it, but we've gotten into a fix now where we're living in a common predicament, and we ought to recognize this common predicament.”

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“We ought to really at least recognize the common predicament of Communists and democrats - or Americans, whatever.”

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“We have to risk a nuclear war in order to escape capitulation to Communism. For all I know, we may stumble into this terrible war.”

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“No nation can say, 'We will capitulate to tyranny rather than accept a speculative fate - to accept an absolute fate in alternative to a speculative one' - no nation can do that.”

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“Politics deals with a common-sense approach to the imponderables of history, that I think are obscured by a certain kind of rationalism.”

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