60. 14 The teachings of faith of the modern-day church attribute to God qualities that are merely human: they say, for example, that God looked at the human race with anger; that he needed to be reconciled to us; that he was in fact reconciled through his love for his Son and through the Son’s intercession; that he needed to be appeased by seeing his Son’s wretched suffering, and this brought him back into a merciful attitude; that he assigns the Son’s justice to unjust people who beg him for it on the basis of their faith alone, and turns them from enemies into friends and from children of wrath into children of grace.

53. 12 The body of teaching espoused by the modern-day church is woven together out of numerous absurdities that have to be taken on faith. Therefore its teachings become part of our memory alone. They do not become part of our higher understanding; they rest instead on supporting evidence from below the level of the intellect.