But we have no [Marian] apparitions cautioning the Church against, say, accepting the delusion of an Earth-centered Universe, or warning it of complicity with Nazi Germany – two matters of considerable moral as well as historical import.. Not a single saint criticized the practice of torturing and burning “witches” and heretics. Why not? Were they unaware of what was going on? Could they not grasp its evil? And why is [the Virgin] Mary always admonishing the poor peasant to inform the authorities? Why doesn’t she admonish the authorities herself? Or the King? Or the Pope? . Carl Sagan
About This Quote

The most extraordinary feature of the Marian apparitions is their complete submissiveness to the will of the Church. Not once did our Lady protest or even complain against what was happening to her. She was not only passive but perfectly acquiescent. Even when she announced herself as the Mother of God, she did not claim divine rights for herself but left her title to the Pope.

Source: The Demonhaunted World: Science As A Candle In The Dark

Some Similar Quotes
  1. Isn't it funny how the memories you cherish before a breakup can become your worst enemies afterwards? The thoughts you loved to think about, the memories you wanted to hold up to the light and view from every angle--it suddenly seems a lot safer to... - Ally Condie

  2. Church was doing what he often did when dropped - lying on his back with all four legs in the air, pretending to be dead in order to induce guilt in his owners. - Cassandra Clare

  3. It takes three to make love, not two: you, your spouse, and God. Without God people only succeed in bringing out the worst in one another. Lovers who have nothing else to do but love each other soon find there is nothing else. Without a... - Fulton J. Sheen

  4. If you live today, you breath in nihilism ... it's the gas you breathe. If I hadn't had the Church to fight it with or to tell me the necessity of fighting it, I would be the stinkingest logical positivist you ever saw right now. - Flannery OConnor

  5. The church must suffer for speaking the truth, for pointing out sin, for uprooting sin. No one wants to have a sore spot touched, and therefore a society with so many sores twitches when someone has the courage to touch it and say: “You have... - Oscar A. Romero

More Quotes By Carl Sagan
  1. Every one of us is, in the cosmic perspective, precious. If a human disagrees with you, let him live. In a hundred billion galaxies, you will not find another.

  2. The cosmos is within us. We are made of star-stuff. We are a way for the universe to know itself.

  3. The Cosmos is all that is or was or ever will be. Our feeblest contemplations of the Cosmos stir us -- there is a tingling in the spine, a catch in the voice, a faint sensation, as if a distant memory, of falling from a...

  4. A celibate clergy is an especially good idea, because it tends to suppress any hereditary propensity toward fanaticism.

  5. We are star stuff harvesting sunlight.

Related Topics