Source: Christianity and the Social Crisis (1907), Ch.4 Why Has Christianity Never Undertaken the Work of Social Reconstruction?, p. 150
“When people impute special vices to the Christian Church, they seem entirely to forget that the world (which is the only other thing there is) has these vices much more. The Church has been cruel; but the world has been much more cruel. The Church has plotted; but the world has plotted much more. The Church has been superstitious; but it has never been so superstitious as the world is when left to itself.”
The Illustrated London News (14 December 1907)
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G. K. Chesterton 229
English mystery novelist and Christian apologist 1874–1936Related quotes
Cardinal Stanisław Dziwisz: “Europe was constructed, and continues to be constructed, upon Christian values” https://visegradpost.com/en/2020/05/18/cardinal-stanislaw-dziwisz-europe-was-constructed-and-continues-to-be-constructed-upon-christian-values/ (18 May 2020)
"The Emotional Factor"Religion is based, I think, primarily and mainly upon fear.
Often paraphrased as "The Christian religion has been and still is the principal enemy of moral progress in the world."
1920s, Why I Am Not a Christian (1927)
Context: You find as you look around the world that every single bit of progress of humane feeling, every improvement in the criminal law, every step toward the diminution of war, every step toward better treatment of the colored races, or even mitigation of slavery, every moral progress that there has been in the world, has been consistently opposed by the organized churches of the world. I say quite deliberately that the Christian religion, as organized in its churches, has been and still is the principal enemy of moral progress in the world.
The Divine Commodity: Discovering A Faith Beyond Consumer Christianity (2009, Zondervan)
Speech at the Langham Hotel (11 February 1926), quoted in On England, and Other Addresses (1926), pp. 195-196.
1926
The trial of Charles B. Reynolds for blasphemy (1887)
Rome, or Reason? A Reply to Cardinal Manning. Part I. The North American Review (1888)
Source: Factfulness: Ten Reasons We're Wrong About the World and Why Things Are Better Than You Think
Magna Moralia XLIX, p. 201.
The Rod, the Root, and the Flower (1895)