What is Best in Christianity

From George Kennan's diaries:

Most human events yield to the erosion of time. The greatest, most amazing, exception to this generalization occurred on the hill of Golgotha. . . . A man, a Jew, some sort of dissident religious prophet, was crucified in company with two common thieves . . . . In the teachings of this man were two things: first the principle of charity of love . . . but secondly, the possibility of redemption in the face of self-knowledge and penitence. . . . The combination of these two things: charity and redemption inspired an entire vast civilization, created a great art, erected a hundred thousand magnificent churches, shaped and disciplined the minds and the values of many generations — placed, in short, its creative stamp on one of the greatest of all flowerings of the human spirit.