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Diversity may be the hardest thing for a society to live with, and perhaps the most dangerous thing for a society to be without.
William Sloane Coffin
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William Sloane Coffin
Age: 81 †
Born: 1924
Born: June 1
Died: 2006
Died: April 12
Activist
Pastor
New York City
New York
William Sloane Coffin
Jr.
Thing
Diversity
Hardest
Perhaps
Dangerous
Society
May
Live
Without
More quotes by William Sloane Coffin
It's so much easier to beat your breast than to stick your neck out.
William Sloane Coffin
There is nothing anti-intellectual in the leap of faith, for faith is not believing without proof but trusting without reservation.
William Sloane Coffin
We call on all members of America's religious communities, as a testament of our common faith, to join Faithful Security, and to take action immediately to break faith with nuclear weapons.
William Sloane Coffin
Every nation makes decisions based on self-interest and defends them on the basis of morality.
William Sloane Coffin
In our time all it takes for evil to flourish is for a few good men to be a little wrong and have a great deal of power, and for the vast majority of their fellow citizens to remain indifferent.
William Sloane Coffin
Hope is a state of mind independent of the state of the world. If your heart's full of hope, you can be persistent when you can't be optimistic. You can keep the faith despite the evidence, knowing that only in so doing has the evidence any chance of changing. So while I'm not optimistic, I'm always very hopeful.
William Sloane Coffin
The temptation to moralize is strong it is emotionally satisfying to have enemies rather than problems, to seek out culprits rather than the flaws in the system.
William Sloane Coffin
Love measures our stature: the more we love, the bigger we are.
William Sloane Coffin
It is terribly important to realize that the leap of faith is not so much a leap of thought as of action. For while in many matters it is first we must see then we will act in matters of faith it is first we must do then we will know, first we will be and then we will see. One must, in short, dare to act wholeheartedly without absolute certainty.
William Sloane Coffin
Jesus is both a mirror to our humanity and a window to divinity, a window revealing as much of God as is given mortal eyes to see. When Christians see Christ empowering the weak, scorning the powerful, healing the wounded, and judging their tormentors, we are seeing transparently the power of God at work.
William Sloane Coffin
Charity is only a waystation on the road to justice.
William Sloane Coffin
The world is too dangerous for anything but truth and too small for anything but love.
William Sloane Coffin
The cause of violence is not ignorance. It is self-interest. Only reverance can restrain violence - reverance for human life and the environment.
William Sloane Coffin
The one true freedom in life is to come to terms with death, and as early as possible, for death is an event that embraces all our lives. And the only way to have a good death is to lead a good life. The more we do God's will, the less unfinished business we leave behind when we die.
William Sloane Coffin
If your heart is full of fear, you won't seek truth you'll seek security. If a heart is full of love, it will have a limbering effect on the mind.
William Sloane Coffin
We have sold our birthright of freedom and justice for a mess of national security.
William Sloane Coffin
To be avoided at all costs is the solace of opinion without the pain of thought.
William Sloane Coffin
God knows it is emotionally satisfying to be righteous with that righteousness that nourishes itself on the blood of sinners. But God also knows that what is emotionally satisfying can be spiritually devastating.
William Sloane Coffin
In life you can either follow your fears or be led by your values, by your passions.
William Sloane Coffin
Compassion and justice are companions, not choices.
William Sloane Coffin
