In the best sense of the word [Jesus] was a radical. . . . His religion has so long been identified with conservatism — often with conservatism of the obstinate and unyielding sort — that it is almost startling for us sometimes to remember that all the conservatism of His own times was against Him, that it was the young, free, restless, sanguine, progressive part of the people who flocked to Him.

—Phillips Brooks

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