30 Magnificent Miroslav Volf Quotes

Miroslav Volf is a Croatian Protestant theologian and public intellectual most known as one of the most celebrate theologians of our time. Serving as Professor of Theology at Yale Divinity School, Volf has obtained two advanced degrees and earned the designation of theologian of the bridge as he explores between the different groups and denominations of the world. Here is a look at some of the most prominent Miroslav Volf quotes ever documented.

“Absolute hospitality would in no way amount to the absence of violence. To the contrary, it would enthrone violence precisely under the guise of nonviolence because it would leave the violators unchanged and the consequences of violence unremedied.”

“All sufferers can find comfort in the solidarity of the Crucified; but only those who struggle against evil by following the example of the Crucified will discover him at their side.”

“Because the Christian God is not a lonely God, but rather a communion of three persons, faith leads human beings into the divine communion.”

“Because there is one God, all people are related to that one God on equal terms. The central command of that one God is to love neighbors—to treat others as we would like them to treat us, as expressed in the Golden Rule.”

“Christ has not come with a blueprint for political arrangements; many kinds of political arrangements are compatible with the Christian faith, from monarchy to democracy.”

“Faith is an expression of the fact that we exist so that the infinite God can dwell in us and work through us for the well-being of the whole creation.”

“Faith is the way we as receivers relate appropriately to God as the giver. It is empty hands held open for God to fill.the true God gives so we can become joyful givers and not just self-absorbed receivers.”

“Forgiveness flounders because I exclude the enemy from the community of humans and myself from the community of sinners.”

“God doesn’t give in order to acquire. God loves without self-seeking; that’s at the heart of who God is. God gives for the benefit of others.”

“God’s gifts aim at making us into generous givers, not just fortunate receivers. God gives so that we, in human measure, can be givers too.”

“Impartiality of the state toward all religions. The only adequate option open to Muslims and Christians as citizens of the same state is to advocate the impartiality of the state toward all religions; no religion is preferred by the state, and all religions are impartially supported.”

“Love properly understood is God—the font of all creation and the ultimate goal of all desires; God properly understood is love.”

“Many would have excommunicated her as well, for in Christian circles the reigning consensus over the years has been that one cannot be simultaneously a Christian and a Muslim.”

“Notice that, in making ourselves available, we are not doing God any favors. We give ourselves for God’s use to benefit creation, not to benefit God.”

“Ritual observance without moral rectitude is worse than empty; it is a counterfeit religious coin with which a worshipper wishes to procure divine and human approval for behavior that deserves censure.”

Speaking at TEDx in Wilmington. Unity of meaning and pleasure in God (see the Epilogue of *Flourishing*) pic.twitter.com/ElbEP8iIIv

— Miroslav Volf (@MiroslavVolf) May 1, 2016

“Sin is here the kind of purity that wants the world cleansed of the other rather than the heart cleansed of the evil that drives people out by calling those who are clean “unclean” and refusing to help make clean those who are unclean.”

“Some theologians claim that all God’s desires culminate in a single desire: to assert and to maintain God’s own glory. On its own, the idea of a glory-seeking God seems to say that God, far from being only a giver, is the ultimate receiver.”

“The cure against Christian violence is not less of the Christian faith, but, in a carefully qualified sense, more of the Christian faith.”

“The difference between justice and forgiveness: To be just is to condemn the fault and, because of the fault, to condemn the doer as well. To forgive is to condemn the fault but to spare the doer. That’s what the forgiving God does.”

“The principle cannot be denied: the fiercer the struggle against the injustice you suffer, the blinder you will be to the injustice you inflict.”

“The sufferings of Christ on the cross are not just his sufferings; they are “the sufferings of the poor and weak, which Jesus shares in his own body and in his own soul, in solidarity with them””

“The true God gives so we can become joyful givers and not just self-absorbed receivers.”

“This is a book about worshiping the true God and letting the true God act in us.”

“Through my memory of the Passion, God can”purify” my memory of wrongs suffered because my identity stems neither from the wrongdoing done to me, which would require the perpetual accusation of my wrongdoer, nor from my own (false) innocence, which would lead me to (illegitimate) self-justification.”

“To live with integrity, it is important to know what’s right and what’s wrong, to be educated morally. However, merely KNOWING is not enough.”

“Two false images of God are particularly irresistible to many of us – mostly unconsciously. The first I’ll designate as God the negotiator and the other, God the Santa Claus.”

“Virtuous character matters more than moral knowledge.”

“We know it is good to receive, and we have been blessed by receiving not only as children, but also as adults.”

“Whatever the reasons, when forgiveness happens it is always a miracle of grace. The obstacles in its way are immense.”

“When we forget that, we unwittingly reduce God’s ways to our ways and God’s thoughts to our thoughts. Our hearts become factories of idols in which we fashion and refashion God to fit our needs and desires.”

Here is a Ted Talk presented by Miroslav Volf as he goes on to discuss the topic of why we need religion in a globalized world.