Foolishness for Christ

The prophet is a fool, the spiritual man is mad. ~ Hosea

Foolishness for Christ refers to behavior such as giving up all one's worldly possessions upon joining a monastic order, or to deliberate flouting of society's conventions to serve a religious purpose.

Quotes

• The days of visitation are come, the days of recompence are come; Israel shall know it: the prophet is a fool, the spiritual man is mad.
  • Hosea 9:7 KJV

• For the message of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but to us who are being saved it is the power of God.
  • Paul of Tarsus, 1 Corinthians 1:18 NIV

• We are fools for Christ's sake.
  • Paul of Tarsus, 1 Corinthians 4:10 KJV

• Let no one take me for a fool. But if you do, then tolerate me just as you would a fool, so that I may do a little boasting. In this self-confident boasting I am not talking as the Lord would, but as a fool.
  • Paul of Tarsus, 2 Corinthians 11:16-17 NIV

• Moria and stultitia are both rendered nowadays as 'folly', but both have far stronger senses than folly has now. They imply derangement of mind, madness, mania. Such are the defects attributed to Christians by the worldly-wise. And vice-versa. ... Although the mutual laughter may seem six of one and half-a-dozen of the other, it is not. The Christian is profoundly mad merely by the standards of the world. To the world the wicked seem wise, but are mad in the sight of God. The Christian is touched by the Infinite and will not only have the last laugh at the end of time: even now he laughs more insanely than the worldlings.
  • Michael Andrew Screech, Laughter at the Foot of the Cross (1998), p. 73