Reinhold Niebuhr Quotes

God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change; courage to change the things I can; and wisdom to know the difference. Living one day at a time; enjoying one moment at a time; accepting hardships as the pathway to peace; taking, as He did, this sinful world as it is, not as I would have it; trusting that He will make all things right if I surrender to His Will; that I may be reasonably happy in this life and supremely happy with Him forever in the next. Amen.

Nothing that is worth doing can be achieved in our lifetime; therefore we must be saved by hope. Nothing which is true or beautiful or good makes complete sense in any immediate context of history; therefore we must be saved by faith. Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone; therefore we must be saved by love. No virtuous act is quite as virtuous from the standpoint of our friend or foe as it is from our standpoint. Therefore we must be saved by the final form of love which is forgiveness.

God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference.

Ultimately evil is done not so much by evil people, but by good people who do not know themselves and who do not probe deeply.

Man's capacity for justice makes democracy possible, but man's inclination to injustice makes democracy necessary.

Every experience proves that the real problem of our existence lies in the fact that we ought to love one another, but do not.

There was a time when I had all the answers. My real growth began when I discovered that the questions to which I had the answers were not the important questions.

It's always wise to seek the truth in our opponents' error, and the error in our own truth.

Nationalism: One of the effective ways in which the modern man escapes life's ethical problems.

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.

Forgiveness is the final form of love.

The stupidity of the average man will permit the oligarch, whether economic or political, to hide his real purposes from the scrutiny of his fellows and to withdraw his activities from effective control. Since it is impossible to count on enough moral goodwill among those who possess irresponsible power to sacrifice it for the good of the whole, it must be destroyed by coercive methods and these will always run the peril of introducing new forms of injustice in place of those abolished.

Religion is so frequently a source of confusion in political life, and so frequently dangerous to democracy, precisely because it introduces absolutes into the realm of relative values.

Toleration of people who differ in convictions and habits requires a residual awareness of the complexity of truth and the possibility of opposing view having some light on one or the other facet of a many-sided truth.

Humor is a prelude to faith and laughter is the beginning of prayer.

Evil is not to be traced back to the individual but to the collective behavior of humanity.

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.

All men are naturally included to obscure the morally ambiguous element in their political cause by investing it with religious sanctity.

Family life is too intimate to be preserved by the spirit of justice. It can only be sustained by a spirit of love which goes beyond justice. Justice requires that we carefully weigh rights and privileges and assure that each member of a community receives his due share. Love does not weigh rights and privileges too carefully because it prompts each to bear the burden of the other.

There are historic situations in which refusal to defend the inheritance of a civilization, however imperfect, against tyranny and aggression may result in consequences even worse than war.

The tendency to claim God as an ally for our partisan value and ends is the source of all religious fanaticism.

Whether the man is an atheist or a Christian, I would judge him by his fruits, and I have therefore many agnostic friends.

God, grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference. Grant me the patience with changes that take time, appreciation of all that I have, tolerance of those with different struggles, and the strength to get up and try again, one day at a time.

The separation of church and state is necessary partly because if religion is good then the state shouldn't interfere with the religious vision or with the religious prophet. There must be a realm of truth beyond political competence, that's why there must be a separation of churches, but if religion is bad and a bad religion is one that gives an ultimate sanctity to some particular cause. Then religion mustn't interfere with the state - so one of the basic Democratic principles as we know it in America is the separation of church and state.

All men who live with any degree of serenity live by some assurance of grace.

If you equate God's judgment with your judgment, you have a wrong religion.

We don't properly discriminate. We never discriminate properly when we're dealing with another group and one of the big problems about religion is that religious people don't know that they are probably as flagrant in these misjudgments as irreligious people.

[There is] an increasing tendency among modern men to imagine themselves ethical because they have delegated their vices to larger and larger groups.

The final wisdom of life requires not the annulment of incongruity but the achievement of serenity within and above it.

One of the most pathetic aspects of human history is that every civilization expresses itself most pretentiously, compounds its partial and universal values most convincingly, and claims immortality for its finite existence at the very moment when the decay which leads to death has already begun.

The cross symbolizes a cosmic as well as historic truth. Love conquers the world, but its victory is not an easy one.

The will-to-live becomes the will-to-power.

The prophet himself stands under the judgment which he preaches. If he does not know that, he is a false prophet.

Nothing we do, however virtuous, can be accomplished alone; therefore we are saved by love.

The measure of our rationality determines the degree of vividness with which we appreciate the needs of other life, the extent to which we become conscious of the real character of our own motives and impulses, the ability to harmonize conflicting impulses in our own life and in society, and the capacity to choose adequate means for approved ends.

We take, and must continue to take, morally hazardous actions to preserve our civilization. We must exercise our power. But we ought neither to believe that a nation is capable of perfect disinterestedness in its exercise, nor become complacent about a particular degree of interest and passion which corrupt the justice by which the exercise of power is legitimatized.

If we survive danger it steels our courage more than anything else.

Life is a battle between faith and reason in which each feeds upon the other, drawing sustenance from it and destroying it.

The significance of the law of love is precisely that it is not just another law, but a law which transcends all law.

Cheese, wine, and a friend must be old to be good.

Goodness, armed with power, is corrupted; and pure love without power is destroyed.

God, give me grace to accept with serenity the things that cannot be changed.

Our age knows nothing but reaction, and leaps from one extreme to another.

Religion, declares the modern man, is consciousness of our highest social values. Nothing could be further from the truth. True religion is a profound uneasiness about our highest social values.

All human sin seems so much worse in its consequences than in its intentions.

While it is possible for intelligence to increase the range of benevolent impulse, and thus prompt a human being to consider the needs and rights of other than those to whom he is bound by organic and physical relationship, there are definite limits in the capacity of ordinary mortals which makes it impossible for them to grant to others what they claim for themselves.

The chief source of man's inhumanity to man seems to be the tribal limits of his sense of obligation to other men.

Self-righteousness is the inevitable fruit of simple moral judgments.

The old prose writers wrote as if they were speaking to an audience; while, among us, prose is invariably written for the eye alone.

Love is the motive, but justice is the instrument.