Heresy
author ·
Heresy is any belief or theory that is strongly at variance with established beliefs or customs, particularly the accepted beliefs or religious law of a religious organization. A heretic is a proponent of heresy.
"All errors that have existed in the Christian Church from the beginning, proceeded from this source, that in some persons, ambition, and in others, covetousness, extinguished the true fear of God. A bad conscience is, therefore, the mother of all heresies..."
"Heresies have never been more than particular opinions, since they began with five or six men."
"The essence of the heretic, that is to say of someone who has a particular opinion, is that he clings to his own ideas; and the essence of the Catholic, that is to say of the universal, is to prefer to his sentiments the common sentiment of the entire Church."
"Religions are kept alive by heresies, which are really sudden explosions of faith. Dead religions do not produce them."
"In the Code of Canon Law the term heretic means a baptized person who, while retaining the name of Christian, stubbornly denies or calls in doubt any truth which is to be accepted on Divine and Catholic Faith. ...a similar excommunication is incurred by those who publish books written by heretics upholding and commending heresy, and by all who defend or knowingly and without due permission read or keep these or any other books prohibited by name by letters Apostolic."
"Truths turn into dogmas the instant that they are disputed. Thus every man who utters a doubt defines a religion."
"Thu hast translated the Romance of the Rose, That is a heresy against my law, And maketh wise folk from me withdraw."
"The word "heresy" not only means no longer being wrong; it practically means being clear-headed and courageous. The word "orthodoxy" not only no longer means being right; it practically means being wrong. All this can mean one thing, and one thing only. It means that people care less for whether they are philosophically right."
"Many a long dispute among divines may be thus abridged: It is so. It is not. It is so. It is not."
"In corporation religions as in others, the heretic must be cast out not because of the probability that he is wrong but because of the possibility that he is right."
"The heresy of one age becomes the orthodoxy of the next."
"Science is in far greater danger from the absence of challenge than from the coming of any number of even absurd challenges."
