Tony Campolo

Tony Campolo

36 quotes

American sociologist and pastor Tony Campolo has a gift for language that makes complex ideas feel instantly clear. Whether reflecting on Government or Marriage, Tony Campolo brought uncommon clarity to every subject. Discover 48 of Tony Campolo's most memorable quotes, ranging across Government, Marriage, Religion, Legal, and Family. One standout: "I am looking for suggestions on what we can do about extremists within our own society. They cannot be ignored."

“Certain things happened in the early church. Women who had never had any freedom suddenly have the ability to stand up and speak and be treated as equals within the life of the church.”

— Tony Campolo

Freedom

All Quotes by Tony Campolo

“Sigmund Freud was the apostle of disbelief. He was the one who made psychoanalysis a part of our culture, and in so doing he kicked out a flying buttress that had been essential for holding up our cathedral of faith.”

— Tony Campolo

Faith

“What is especially important is addressing the question of how religion can be enforced through political means and what can be done to create a political environment that, on the one hand, acknowledges the role of religion in society, while on the other hand does not impose one religion on the populace at the expense of all others.”

— Tony Campolo

Religion

“After-school tutoring programs, care for the elderly, shelters for the homeless, disaster relief work, and a variety of other services would all benefit from government funding.”

— Tony Campolo

Government

“From the beginning, there have been some religious leaders who greeted the funding of faith-based social services by government with ambivalence.”

— Tony Campolo

Government

“It is hard to say what the future holds, but this is probable - it won't be just like the past.”

— Tony Campolo

Future

“Religion, for better or for worse, has been politicized in blatant ways that have seldom been equaled in American elections.”

— Tony Campolo

Religion

“While a case can be made for intelligent design, I can't figure out why some Christians are so thrilled about that possibility. First of all, it doesn't prove there's a God. If anything, intelligent design lends support to some form of pantheism that defines God as immanent within nature.”

— Tony Campolo

Design

“Sadly, we do a much better job of making people feel guilty than we do of delivering them from the guilt we create. We need to confess this and change our ways.”

— Tony Campolo

Change

“If marriage really is a sacred institution, then why is the government controlling it, especially in a nation that affirms separation of church and state?”

— Tony Campolo

Government

“Certain things happened in the early church. Women who had never had any freedom suddenly have the ability to stand up and speak and be treated as equals within the life of the church.”

— Tony Campolo

Freedom

“Clinton's successor in the White House, George W. Bush, was committed to expanding government spending for faith-based initiatives.”

— Tony Campolo

Government

“Getting the government to put money into social programs run by religious institutions is a practice that started during the Clinton years, when Bill Clinton advocated the AmeriCorps program.”

— Tony Campolo

Government

“I contend the state ought to do its thing and provide legal rights for all couples who want to be joined together for life. The church should bless unions that it sees fit to bless, and they should be called marriages.”

— Tony Campolo

Legal

“It's a new day for the Democrats when it comes to matters of faith, and the younger Evangelicals are aware of this and many of them are moving into the Democratic camp.”

— Tony Campolo

Faith

“Who's to say that there is any more support for Freud's psychoanalytic concept of the superego than there is for that old time religion that asserted that there is a God who ordains what is right and wrong, and that His righteousness endures for all generations?”

— Tony Campolo

Religion

“I, for one, am quite willing to join the 'forgive, forget and move on' crowd, but it does make me wonder if Evangelicals are going to sound believable when they say that they tend to vote Republican because of their religious commitments to the family.”

— Tony Campolo

Family

“There is no doubt that religion had already waned under the onslaught of the Enlightenment, but it was Freud who provided the radically new understanding of human nature that made any religious explanation of the whats and whys of our personhood seem naive.”

— Tony Campolo

Nature

“If a guy is intimidated by a woman in leadership, he has real problems with his own concepts of masculinity. That's a harsh statement, but I believe it to be true.”

— Tony Campolo

Leadership

“Those issues are biblical issues: to care for the sick, to feed the hungry, to stand up for the oppressed. I contend that if the evangelical community became more biblical, everything would change.”

— Tony Campolo

Change

“What if Barack Obama established a Presidential Advisory Committee that would meet once every couple of months, bringing together the former presidents for a conference in order to seek their collective wisdom? There is a wealth of experience in former presidents that generally goes untapped.”

— Tony Campolo

Experience