Baptists have long upheld the ideal of a free church in a free state. And from the beginning, they believed that forcing a person to worship against his will violated the principles of both Christianity and civility.
I'm getting married in the morning! / Ding dong! the bells are gonna chime. / Pull out the stopper! Let's have a whopper! / But get me to the church on time!.
If we make sacrifices in doing good or in doing ill, it does not alter the ultimate value of our actions; even if we stake our life in the cause, as martyrs do for the sake of our church : it is a sacrifice to our longing for power, or for the purpose of conserving our sense of power.
I am highly susceptible to the force of all truly religious music, especially to the music of my own church, the church of Shelley, Michelangelo, and Beethoven.
"President Monson, I may never see the Prophet. I may never hear the Prophet. But President, far better, now that I am a member of this Church, I can obey the Prophet."
I was probably toward 8 1/2 when I actually joined the church and was baptized - and, my God, did I take it seriously! I was a zealot who irritated every one of my third-grade friends. They didn't beat me up, but I got labeled "the preacher girl."
SACERDOTALIST, n. One who holds the belief that a clergyman is a priest. Denial of this momentous doctrine is the hardest challenge that is now flung into the teeth of the Episcopalian church by the Neo-Dictionarians.