Peter Kreeft Quotes

In an age that has thrown off all tradition, the only rebellion possible is orthodoxy.

If you love, you will suffer. The only way to protect yourself against suffering is to protect yourself against love - and that is the greatest suffering of all, loneliness.

Moral relativism has a reputation for being compassionate, caring and humane, but it is an extremely useful philosophy for tyrants.

The opposite of Christianity is not atheism, but idolatry.

Moral stupidity comes in two different forms: relativism and legalism. Relativism sees no principles, only people; legalism sees no people, only principles.

One of the few things in life that cannot possibly do harm in the end is the honest pursuit of the truth.

Don't be more serious than God. God invented dog farts.

There is one and only one possible road to joy: selfless love.

Abortion is the Antichrist's demonic parody of the eucharist. That's why it uses the same holy words, "This is my body," with the blasphemous opposite meaning.

The heart is like a woman, and the head is like a man, and although man is the head of woman, woman is the heart of man, and she turns man's head because she turns his heart.

If God is not a Trinity, God is not love. For love requires three things: a lover, a beloved, and a relationship between them.

There is no scientific proof that only scientific proofs are good proofs; no way to prove by the scientific method that the scientific method is the only valid method.

We need to have the mind of a conservative and the heart of a liberal.

The national anthem of hell is, "I Did It My Way."

The greatest Christians in history seem to say that their sufferings ended up bringing them the closest to God - so this is the best thing that could happen, not the worst.

Everything smaller than Heaven bores us because only Heaven is bigger than our hearts.

The womb is like an altar, it's the place where God continually comes into the world and does what only God can do...create.

The opposite of theism is not atheism, it’s idolatry

Listening to other people's needs is listening to God. Noticing simple, natural beauty, hearing music, even confronting the challenge of pain and problems - that can all be listening to God too.

Why pray if we cannot change God? ...is that why we pray? To change omniscient Love? Isn't it rather to learn what it is and to fulfill it? Not to change it by our acts, but to change our acts by it.

Sinners think they are saints, but saints know they are sinners.

Control language and you control thought; control thought and you control action; control action and you control the world.

All of history is a kind of broken marriage and God puts it back together again.

Nothing but prayer can make saints because nothing but God can make saints, and we meet God in prayer. Prayer is the hospital for souls where we meet Doctor God.

Your heart is like an infinitely large hole, and only God is big enough to fill it.

Grey is the devil's favorite color.

In an age of hope men looked up at the night sky and saw “the heavens." In an age of hopelessness they call it simply “space.

You have to say no to something else, in order to make time to pray.

Suffering is not blessed because it is suffering but because it is [Christ's]. Suffering is not the context that explains the cross; the cross is the context that explains suffering.

How will the Tower of Babel be undone? How will we understand each other in Heaven? Will we all speak English or Dutch or Latin? No, we will speak music.

God writes the story of our lives with the pen strokes of our own free choices.

This is the secret of life: the self lives only by dying, finds its identity (and its happiness) only by self-forgetfulness, self-giving, self-sacrifice, and agape love.

Only God may be adored, because only God is unlimited goodness, truth, and beauty, and thus only God deserves unlimited love.

The most compelling evidence for God's existence is Christ. If God does not exist, then Christ was the biggest fool who ever lived.

Sacraments are like hoses. They are the channels of the living water of God's grace. Our faith is like opening the faucet. We can open it a lot, a little, or not at all.

Conscience is thus explained only as the voice of God in the soul.

Humility is not an exaggeratedly low opinion of yourself. Humility is self-forgetfulness.

Kindness-mere kindness-cannot tolerate suffering. Love can.

The secret of joy is hidden in the word itself: first J, then O, then Y: Jesus first, Others next, Yourself last.

Reason alone cannot give you a whole steak, but it sure helps with identifying bologna.

Be egalitarian regarding persons. Be elitist regarding ideas.

An open mind is not an end in itself but a means to the end of finding truth.

A saint isn't somebody who tries harder, but someone who trusts more.

Great saints have often been made out of great sinners, but not one was ever made out of a wimp.

Trying to fill the God-sized hole in our hearts with things other than God is like trying to fill the Grand Canyon with marbles.

In an age of relativism, orthodoxy is the only possible rebellion left

The most total opposite of pleasure is not pain but boredom, for we are willing to risk pain to make a boring life interesting.

A pure heart means a single heart, a heart in which only one desire lives: love.

If you didn't believe in objective truth, arguments would be just toys, or games, or jokes.

The only reason you are not yet a saint is because you do not wholly want to be one.