We pretend we would have spoken out for the Jews in Bonhoeffer's day, or that we would have spoken against the slave trade in Wilberforce's day, but are we speaking out today on the issues that are no less important to God in our time? If not, we are deceiving ourselves.

God wants to see human beings, not ghosts who shun the world. In the whole of world history there is only one real significant hour ... the present ... if you want to find eternity, you must serve the times.

He and his allies declared that every human being was equal in God's sight and made in the image of God, and must therefore be treated with equal dignity.

Today, Wilberforce University welcomes many of America's poorest and most underserved populations and transforms their educational dreams into realities.

Nowadays we often ask ourselves whether we still need the Church, whether we still need God. But this question, he said, is wrong. We are the ones who are questioned. The Church exists and God exists, and we are asked whether we are willing to be of service, for God needs us.

Although I know full well and hear every day that many people think little of me and say that I only write little pamphlets and sermons in German for the uneducated laity, I do not let that stop me. Would to God that in my lifetime I had, to my fullest ability, helped one layman to be better!

Of the many societal problems Wilberforce might have thought needed his attention, slavery would have been the least visible of all, and by a wide margin.

It may just mean that the best way to cut the ever-increasing costs of health care around the world will be to provide cheap smartphones with Internet service to those who otherwise could not afford to buy them.

I came to realize that life lived to help others is the only one that matters and that it sis my duty ... This is my highest and best use as a human.

I consider the homeless just as important as the richest of the rich.

The Lord only knows how many times I let my children go hungry rather than take secretly the bread I liked not to ask for.

I thought my life was mapped out. Research, living in the forest, teaching and writing. But in '86 I went to a conference and realised the chimpanzees were disappearing. I had worldwide recognition and a gift of communication. I had to use them.