A Quote by Mark Twain
This is a Christian country. Why, so is hell. Inasmuch as Strait is the way and narrow is the gate, and few - few - are they that enter in thereat has had the natural effect of making hell the only really prominent Christian community in any of the worlds; but we don't brag of this and certainly it is not proper to brag and boast that America is a Christian country when we all know that certainly five-sixths of our population could not enter in at the narrow gate.
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He that will be knighted must kneel for it, and he that will enter in at the strait gate must crowd for it-a gate made so on purpose, narrow and hard in the entrance, yet, after we have entered, wide and glorious, that after our pain our joy may be the sweeter.
We have no reason to be discouraged and cast down if the religion we profess is not popular and few agree with us. We must remember the words of our Lord Jesus Christ in this passage: ‘The gate is narrow’. Repentance, and faith in Christ, and holiness of life, have never been fashionable. The true flock of Christ has always been small. It must not move us to find that we are reckoned singular, and peculiar, and bigoted, and narrow minded. This is the ‘narrow way’. Surely it is better to enter into eternal life with a few, than to go to ‘destruction’ with a great company
Since ... 'the kingdom of heaven suffers violence and the violent take it by force' (Mt. 11:12), and it is impossible for the faithful to enter it by any other way, unless they come through the narrow gate of trials and tribulations, the divine oracle rightly commands us, saying: 'Strive to enter by the narrow door' (Lk. 13:24). Again He says, 'By your endurance you will gain your souls' (Lk. 21:19), and, 'Through many tribulations we must enter the kingdom of heaven' (Acts 14:22).
If all, or the majority of humanity, end up in heaven, then Jesus made a mistake in his pronouncement that only a few will enter through the "narrow gate" into heaven. And if Jesus was wrong about this, then one could assume that he may have been wrong about a number of other issues of which he spoke.
For the Christian mystics, detachment meant to leave attachment so that God could enter you and take over completely and you could climb the ladder to their heaven. Kind of crazy, but what the hell?
The way to heaven is too steep, too narrow for men to dance in and keep revel rout. No way is large or smooth enough for capering rousters, for jumping, skipping, dancing dames but that broad, beaten, pleasant road that leads to hell. The gate of heaven is too narrow for whole rounds, whole troops of dancers to march in together.
The Golden Rule is to 'do unto others as you would have them do unto you.' Allegedly, America is a Christian country. This means that Christian America is following Jesus' Sermon on the Mount in a masochistic way.
That the religious right completely took over the word Christian is a given. At one time, phrases such as Christian charity and Christian tolerance were used to denote kindness and compassion. To perform a "Christian" act meant an act of giving, of acceptance, of toleration. Now, Christian is invariably linked to right-wing conservative political thought -- Christian nation, Christian morality, Christian values, Christian family.
I think of novels in architectural terms. You have to enter at the gate, and this gate must be constructed in such a way that the reader has immediate confidence in the strength of the building.
Those who love their dream of a Christian community more than the Christian community itself become destroyers of that Christian community even though their personal intentions may be ever so honest, earnest, and sacrificial.
For every second of time was the strait gate through which the Messiah might enter.
A Christian is not somebody who stays away from all the wicked things he loves and clings to all the righteous things he hates so that he can go to heaven. The fear of the Christian is not going to hell. The fear of the Christian is being separated from Christ.
A Christian way of thinking is not just thinking Christian thoughts, singing Christian songs, reading Christian books, going to Christian schools; it is learning to think about the whole spectrum of life from the perspective of a mind that has been trained in truth.
Thus Christian humanism is as indispensable to the Christian way of life as Christian ethics and a Christian sociology.
But the consequences of the whole-hearted and uncritical embrace of politics by Christians has been, IN EFFECT, to reduce Christian faith to a political ideology and various Christian denominations and para-church organizations as special interest groups. The political engagement of the various Christian groups is certainly legal, but in ways that are undoubtedly unintended, it has also been counterproductive of the ends to which they aspire.
I have a very traditional Christian faith, so I want to believe that there's a God. But I haven't really thought about it too much. I don't really buy the idea of hell, I struggle a bit with that part of the Christian story, it just seems to be overdoing it. But whether I can choose what I believe and don't believe, I don't know.
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