Inasmuch as I am man and a child of Adam, I belong to hell. If I had on my side all manner of self-appointed piety, austerity, fervent devotion, and good works, and wished to rely on them, I should be damned and lost. But if you believe through Christ, who died for your sin and is risen for your salvation, you have become a brother of Christ, and a child of God, and have been baptised in that faith, you can say: Now I am no longer Adam's child, no longer a sinner, so long as I belong to this brotherhood.—Martin Luther, Sermons from 1530
Even the New Testament bids me love my neighbor 'as myself', which would be a horrible command if the self were simply to be hated. Yet Our Lord also says that a true disciples must 'hate his own life.'—C. S. Lewis, Business of Heaven, p. 179.
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