“Is our starting point God or man, a Christian humanism or secular humanism. . .?…When the human being sets himself or herself in the first place before the Lord Almighty, which is generally called “humanism,” what follows is a rearrangement of values. When I ask the meaning of life for me – why am I living, what is the root from which I draw my morals and actions, what is the basis for making any and all decisions, right and wrong are not absolute but rather determine what is good for me at any moment of time. God may be the Creator of all that exists, including me. He may have a plan that caused me to be brought into the world and live with some purpose in His mind. However, unless I can understand or figure out what that purpose is all about, it really doesn’t motivate me to try to direct my life as though I can or should know. Let the Church say that I am alive only by the grace of the Holy Spirit, I thank the Spirit, even the Father and Christ Jesus, but it has no absolute significance regarding the decisions I make or the pathway that I follow.” (Archpriest Antony Gabriel, Very Rev. Vladimir Berzonsky)
“The love of the world in kindest terms is humanism. More accurate would be agnosticism, since that means those who either don’t think through a faith in God, or just don’t care. Because it’s everywhere in our society, it’s not so simple to define, like asking a fish what water looks like. Perhaps it’s like the judge struggling to give a legal definition of pornography who said, “You know it when you see it.” This mindset or attitude to life is in the media and especially on television.” (Very Rev. Vladimir Berzonsky)
“Humanism rightly sees that man is a glorious being, but it errs in supposing that man can be glorious while rebelling against God. Secular humanism (there have been many varieties of humanism throughout the years) even declares that man’s glory consists in rebelling against God. All this is futile. Man finds his true dignity while kneeling before God; his true calling in gratefully adoring Him.” (Fr. Lawrence Farley)
“Christian humanism is nothing but reclaiming the basic inheritance of the world as it is: the natural and organic connection between the works of culture and the religious roots and vistas of the human being. It is the current separation that is artificial, not the other way round.” (Virgil Nemoianu)
“A healthy, genuine and functional humanism always has at its center love and charity. Care for our fellow human beings, especially care for those in need, difficulty and pain…Humanism without intense love, deep care and honest concern for suffering human beings is simply not humanism at all…By focusing on God becoming a human being in the person of Christ thus, opening the avenue for human beings to become partakers of the Divine nature. Here humanism as a theory about human beings reaches unheard of and undreamt of heights,… These messages offer to us today, as they have throughout many centuries in the past, the most refreshing, most powerful and most creative insights into a genuine and truly human humanism, a humanism which begins with God, grows with God and culminates with God transforming the human being into a partaker of the Divine nature…Christ didn’t come to make us Christians. He came to make us fully human.” (Ecumenical Patriarch Bartholomew, Hans Rookmaaker)