Dalton Beard

“Let us go a step farther. From the crisis of
today the Church of tomorrow will emerge-
a Church that has lost much. She will become
small and will have to start afresh more or less
from the beginning. She will no longer be able
to inhabit many of the edifices she built in pros-
perity. As the number of her adherents dimin-
ishes, so will she lose many of her social privi-
leges. In contrast to an earlier age, she will be
seen much more as a voluntary society, entered
only by free decision. As a small society, she will
make much bigger demands on the initiative of
her individual members. Undoubtedly she will
discover new forms of ministry and will ordain to
the priesthood approved Christians who pursue
some profession. In many smaller congregations
or in self-contained social groups, pastoral care
will normally be provided in this fashion. Along-
side this, the full-time ministry of the priesthood will be indispensable as formerly. But in all of the
changes at which one might guess, the Church
will find her essence afresh and with full conviction in that which was always at her center:
faith in the triune God, in Jesus Christ, the Son
of God made man, in the presence of the Spirit
until the end of the world. In faith and prayer
she will again recognize her true center and ex-
perience the sacraments again as the worship of
God and not as a subject for liturgical scholar-
ship.”
― Pope Benedict XVI

“The Christian God came, not as a deus
ex machina to set everything externally in order,
but as the Son of Man in order interiorly to share
in the passion of mankind. And this, too, is precisely the task of the Christian: to share in the
passion of mankind from within, to extend the
sphere of human being so that it will find room
for the presence of God.”
― Pope Benedict XVI

“There are many things from which I might have derived good, by which I have not profited, I dare say," returned the nephew. "Christmas among the rest. But I am sure I have always thought of Christmas time, when it has come round -- apart from the veneration due to its sacred name and origin, if anything belonging to it can be apart from that -- as a good time: a kind, forgiving, charitable, pleasant time: the only time I know of, in the long calendar of the year, when men and women seem by one consent to open their shut-up hearts freely, and to think of people below them as if they really were fellow-passengers to the grave, and not another race of creatures bound on other journeys. And therefore, Uncle, though it has never put a scrap of gold or silver in my pocket, I believe that it has done me good, and will do me good; and I say, God bless it!" Fred, A Christmas Carol.”
― Charles Dickens, A Christmas Carol

“The increase in diversified organizations engaged
in meeting various human needs is ultimately due to the fact that the command of love of neighbour is inscribed by the Creator in man's very nature. It is also a result of the presence of Christianity in the world, since Christianity constantly revives and acts out this imperative, so often profoundly obscured in the course of time. The reform of paganism attempted by the emperor Julian the Apostate is only an initial example of this effect; here we see how the power of Christianity spread well beyond the frontiers of the Christian faith. For this reason, it is very important that the Church's charitable activity maintains all of its splendor and does not become just another form of social assistance.”
― Pope Benedict XVI, Deus caritas est: Of Christian Love