Albert Nolan > Quotes

“Detachment, properly understood, means freedom, inner freedom. And, although it is not a word Jesus used, detachment expresses very well an important element in his spirituality: the ability to let go. In the Christian tradition this has been spoken of as “purity of heart” or as the process of becoming “poor in spirit.”
― Albert Nolan, Jesus Today: A Spirituality of Radical Freedom

“Our primary concern in these three chapters will not be Jesus’ life, his story—nor even his teachings. Our primary concern will be his spirituality. He does not seem to have spoken much about his own spiritual life, but, as I pointed out in the introduction, by reading between the lines we can extrapolate some of the elements of what must have been an extraordinarily profound spirituality. We will have to look at what Jesus did and said and taught, but only in order to appreciate the spirituality that must have been behind his activities and teachings. What was the secret of his extraordinary life—and death? What did he feel strongly about? What was so memorable about him? What”
― Albert Nolan, Jesus Today: A Spirituality of Radical Freedom

“Self-organizing Systems Biologists have long given up the idea that living organisms are just like machines. Medical practitioners today recognize the ineffectiveness of treating the human body as a separate mechanism. They speak about holistic healing, treating the whole person, and including the person’s social and physical environment. Today living organisms are described as self-regulating systems. They organize themselves, nourish themselves, heal themselves, propagate themselves, protect themselves, and interact creatively with other systems. We used to call this instinct—in animals if not in plants. Today we talk about genes that have coded messages or instructions that connect with one another in a DNA spiral in the nucleus of every living cell. If we were to write out the instructions contained in any one tiny DNA spiral we would fill about a thousand books of six hundred pages each.”
― Albert Nolan, Jesus Today: A Spirituality of Radical Freedom

“The system is a monster which devours people for the sake of its profits.”
― Albert Nolan, Jesus Before Christianity

“A miracle in the Bible is an unusual event which has been understood as an unusual act of God, a mighty work. Certain acts of God are called miracles or wonders because of their ability to astonish and surprise us, their ability to make us marvel and wonder. Thus creation is a miracle, grace is a miracle, the growth of an enormous mustard tree from a tiny seed is a miracle, the liberation of the Israelites from Egypt was a miracle, the kingdom of God will be a miracle. The world is full of miracles for those who have eyes to see them. If we are no longer able to wonder and marvel except when the so-called laws of nature are broken, then we must be in a sorry state.”
― Albert Nolan, Jesus Before Christianity

“Another interesting way in which the mechanistic worldview is being transcended is through discoveries having to do with chaos theory. It seems that systems of various kinds often exist in a state of chaos or, as they say, “on the edge of chaos,” and then suddenly and unpredictably there emerges something called a “strange attractor” that rearranges the chaos into some new order.”
― Albert Nolan, Jesus Today: A Spirituality of Radical Freedom

“mustard seed and the moving of mountains are both metaphors. Faith, like a mustard seed, is an apparently small and insignificant thing that can achieve impossibly great things. What faith can achieve is like moving mountains or, as Luke would have it, like moving a mulberry tree. One suspects some early confusion of metaphors here. Nevertheless, the point is clear enough. Faith, for Jesus, is an almighty power, a power that can achieve the impossible.7”
― Albert Nolan, Jesus Before Christianity

“The most certain and well-attested fact about Jesus of Nazareth is that he was tried, sentenced and executed by the Roman procurator Pontius Pilate on a charge of high treason. This does not make him unique. Many thousands of Jewish rebels and revolutionaries were crucified by the Roman rulers of Palestine during this period.”
― Albert Nolan, Jesus Before Christianity

“The remarkable thing about Jesus was that, although he came from the middle class and had no appreciable disadvantages himself, he mixed socially with the lowest of the low and identified himself with them. He became an outcast by choice.”
― Albert Nolan, Jesus Before Christianity

“Jesus was immeasurably more human than other human beings,”
― Albert Nolan, Jesus Before Christianity

“The "kingdom" in which Jesus wanted his contemporaries to believe was a "kingdom" of love and service, a "kingdom" of human brotherhood and sisterhood in which every person is loved and respected because he or she is a person. We cannot believe in and hope for such a "kingdom" unless we have learned to be moved with compassion for our fellow-beings.”
― Albert Nolan, Jesus Before Christianity

“Organized religion has been of very little help in this crisis. In fact it has sometimes tended to make matters worse. The type of religion that emphasizes a supernatural world in such a way that one does not need to be concerned about the future of this world and all its peoples, offers a form of escape that makes it all the more difficult to solve our problems.”
― Albert Nolan, Jesus Before Christianity