Kirby Page Quotes

The supreme task before the people of the United States today is the Americanizing and, above all, the Christianizing of the great cities of the country. ...It calls for consecrated leadership and prayer of the intensest sort.

Cooperation and mutuality produce goodwill and harmony, whereas competition for special privilege divides men into warring camps.

War is planned devastation and organized slaughter. ...War is continued devastation and slaughter until the enemy yields or until a nation's own defeat is acknowledged.

Feebleness of confidence in the power of international goodwill operating through appropriate agencies of international justice and friendship is at present paralyzing efforts to take the steps which must be taken if war is to be averted.

These mighty weapons of explosion and fire are already obsolete, and the improved weapons of today will be dwarfed by the monstrous weapons of tomorrow.

Shall we use the weapons of violence and bloodshed or is there a more effective weapon available?

Followers of Jesus in our day will, by their compassionate concern for the victims of greed and blindness, be stimulated to search more diligently for means of increased persuasiveness of wrongdoers, on the one hand, and for ethical means of restraint, on the other. They will be prepared also to rely exclusively upon means which are consistent with the worthy ends sought, and to take consequences of following Jesus' way of life.

When we are told that the record is scanty and unreliable, we can reply, with the support of the highest scholarship, that we know enough to be sure of his basic ideas and experiences, and that his personality looms up more brilliantly than the Morning Star.

Preparedness to use atomic bombs against men and women and children is a proclamation of faith, a confession of confidence in the rightness and effectiveness of human slaughter as a means of seeking safety and of maintaining justice.

The police take action against the criminal himself; not against his family and friends. War does not deal merely with the guilty men but destroys multitudes of innocent people; indeed, it does far more damage to the innocent than to the guilty.

Men must be reminded that as civilization becomes more industrial and urban, relationships become more impersonal, and that much of our sinning is done as members of groups.

Prevailing customs and existing institutions are threatened by pioneers and prophets as well as by robbers and murderers, with the result that saints and sinners have often been thrust into adjoining cells. The crucifixion of Jesus between two thieves is the supreme illustration of a historic truth that nobility and depravity have often received the same punishment.

A Christian is never justified in following a course of action that is utterly opposed to the principles of the Kingdom, not even to serve the temporal well being of family or nation.

Another serious charge against Jesus was that of treason to his country. His admonition to refrain from hatred and retaliation and instead to love the Romans seemed to the patriots of the day nothing less than disloyalty and treachery to his native land... There is little doubt as to what would have happened to an American citizen early in 1918 if he had arisen in a Liberty Loan mass meeting and pleaded for the immediate cessation of hostilities and protested against the hatred being manifested toward the Germans.

Can the use of physical force ever be reconciled with the family spirit? ...On one occasion he appears to have resorted to force himself... It sheds no light upon the question as to whether the taking of life, capital punishment, or war are ever justifiable. The criterion by which Jesus judges every method is this; Can it be used appropriately in the home?