Quotes about Idolatry

The institution of the democratic State is a remarkable example of modern idolatry. By ritually celebrating elections that are played out like a great social mass, the State allows us to participate in a religion that will influence the idol in our favour. If we make the idol an offering of the right ballot, it will bring us security, lifetime employment, a guaranteed pension, free medical care, environmental protection and a good school for our children. All these favours will rain down on us. We will not have to do anything to earn them. What could be more magical than that belief?

Many are those who project their imaginings outside themselves and create gods “in their own image and likeness.”  The powers they would adore are those that can grant them all the boons they yearn for in this world and the next.  They are answered by Christ’s word:  “Ye know not what ye ask” (Mark 10:38).

            Their wish is for an idol to protect and favor them, or else for a divine being who can be loved possessively.  But the paradises, like gods, are made by men according to their desires, and their misfortune will be that they will often find what they have imagined.  But what we can imagine is no part of the inexpressible Divine.