We’re spending 6 weeks in worship in the the fall exploring a new series called “Conversations with an Atheist.” A few of those weeks we will be diving into issues where faith and science have come into conflict.
I found this post today on Mark Sayers’ blog doing some research. Enjoy!
In a time when Christians and the Church are obsessed with improving our standing in the public eye, the below quote is a timely reminder that we as the people of God need to be less focussed upon window dressing, and more motivated by what God has called us to be in the world.
Albert Einstein had every reason to despise the Church, first he was a world leader in a profession which for centuries had held a difficult relationship with the Church. Secondly and more importantly he was a Jew, a people group who despite being at the centre of the biblical witness had for centuries been persecuted by Christians.
“Being a lover of freedom, when the revolution came in Germany, I looked to the universities to defend it, knowing that they had always boasted of their devotion to the cause of truth; but, no, the universities immediately were silenced. Then I looked to the great editors of the newspapers whose flaming editorials in days gone by had proclaimed their love of freedom; but they, like the universities, were silenced in a few short weeks.
Only the Church stood squarely across the path of Hitler’s campaign for suppressing truth. I never had any special interest in the Church before, but now I feel a great affection and admiration because the Church alone has had the courage and persistence to stand for intellectual truth and moral freedom. I am forced thus to confess that what I once despised I now praise unreservedly.”
Albert Einstein. Time Magazine Dec 23, 1940
Jesse M.
November 8, 2011 at 5:53 am
However, Einstein later claimed that this quote was a complete distortion of what he had actually said in the interview, and had harsh criticisms of the Catholic Church’s conduct under the Nazi regime–see the “Misattributed” section of Einstein’s wikiquote page at http://en.wikiquote.org/wiki/Albert_Einstein#Misattributed for an extended discussion of this quote and other later comments by Einstein.