“Math will hurt their feelings, because math reminds everybody of the Last Judgment. The answer is right or wrong, and you can’t blow sunshine at it.”

Keep Your Kids, p. 51

“So in this powder key called Jerusalem, what did Jesus do? Did Jesus come in to pour soothing oil on troubled waters? No, He went into the Temple, for crying out loud, and started flipping over tables . . . We call it the cleansing of the Temple, of course, because it is thousands of years in the past, and we read a bronze plaque about it in the Museum of Heroic Bygone Deeds. What would we call it if it had happened last week? Vandalism? Performance art? Prophecy without a permit?”

Mere Christendom, pp. 54-55

“Now can we all agree that these crowds, as warmly affectionate toward John the Baptist as they might have been, and as doggedly committed to the honor of the rabbi Jesus as they were, were people who had not taken on board the full import of what the Scriptures had required of them? I mean, had you gone to one of their rallies, who knows what kind of flags might have been there? And did their presence in the mix in any way discredit what Jesus was up to? Not even a little bit.”

Mere Christendom, p. 53

“Character is hard. Character is built through difficulty. Character grows when you are out in the rain, picking up rocks. But personality grows, or thinks it does, when it is being flattered, stroked, cajoled, and otherwise lied to.”

Keep Your Kids, p. 50

“Character wants to deliver a product; personality wants to get a sale.”

Keep Your Kids, p. 49