11 Quotes by Martin E. Marty

To give the whole store away to match what this year's market says the unchurched want is to have the people who know least about the faith determine most about its expression.

All the truly deep people have at the core of their being the genius to be simple or to know how to seek simplicity.

The people who are good at being civil often lack strong convictions and people who have strong convictions often lack civility.

There is no reason to make the search for friendship sound like an animal instinct. Friendship does not always come as a result of a search; it can come when we least look for it, just as it denies itself when we pursue it too earnestly and with pathetic eagerness.

A saint has to be a misfit. A person who embodies what his culture considers typical or normal cannot be exemplary.

Even the cry from the depths is an affirmation: Why cry if there is no hint of hope of hearing?

If you go deep enough into any faith tradition, you find the common ground with all faith traditions.

Each conquest of distance reveals greater distance.

I have a hard time picturing several aspects of the modern world without Luther.