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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.

Reinhold Niebuhr

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Reinhold Niebuhr
Age: 78 †
Born: 1892
Born: June 21
Died: 1971
Died: June 1
Ethicist
Philosopher
Political Scientist
Theologian
University Teacher
Wright City
Missouri
Karl Paul Reinhold Niebuhr
Terrible
Risk
War
Order
Capitulation
May
Stumble
Communism
Escape
Nuclear

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History may defeat the Christ but it nevertheless points to him as the law of life.
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The mastery of nature is vainly believed to be an adequate substitute for self mastery.
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Nationalism: One of the effective ways in which the modern man escapes life's ethical problems.
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Our dreams of bringing the whole of human history under the control of the human will are ironically refuted by the fact that no group of idealists can easily move the pattern of history toward the desired goal of peace and justice. The recalcitrant forces in the historical drama have a power and persistence beyond our reckoning.
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I'm not afraid of too many things, and I got that invincible kind of attitude from my father.
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Perhaps the most significant moral characteristic of a nation is its hypocrisy.
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All this talk about atheistic materialism and God-fearing American I think is beside the point it's a rather vapid form of religion.
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Since inequalities of privilege are greater than could possibly be defended rationally, the intelligence of privileged groups is usually applied to the task of inventing specious proofs for the theory that universal values spring from, and that general interests are served by, the special privileges which they hold.
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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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Goodness, armed with power, is corrupted and pure love without power is destroyed.
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Rationalism belongs to the cool observer. But because of the stupidity of the average person, they follow not reason, but faith. This naïve faith, requires necessary illusions and emotionally potent oversimplifications, which are provided by the myth maker to keep the ordinary person on course.
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The final wisdom of life requires not the annulment of incongruity but the achievement of serenity within and above it.
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The essence of man is his freedom. Sin is committed in that freedom. Sin can therefore not be attributed to a defect in his essence. It can only be understood as a self-contradiction, made possible by the fact of his freedom but not following necessarily from it.
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I don't know whether any religious leader would say that we must ultimately win, because we're on God's side. If they do say that, it's bad religion.
Reinhold Niebuhr
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Love is the motive, but justice is the instrument.
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The prophet himself stands under the judgment which he preaches. If he does not know that, he is a false prophet.
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Every experience proves that the real problem of our existence lies in the fact that we ought to love one another, but do not.
Reinhold Niebuhr
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[There is] an increasing tendency among modern men to imagine themselves ethical because they have delegated their vices to larger and larger groups.
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The more complex the world situation becomes, the more scientific and rational analysis you have to have, the less you can do with simple good will and sentiment.
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A church has the right to set its own standards within its community. I don't think it has a right to prohibit birth control or to enforce upon a secular society its conception of divorce and the indissolubility of the marriage tie.
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