The Holly and the Ivy (1952)

Ralph Richardson: Rev. Martin Gregory

Photos 

Quotes 

• Rev. Martin Gregory : Why do you think I became a parson in the first place? Because I saw what life is like. Not because I didn't.

• Rev. Martin Gregory : There's the church. A great little country church standing up there in the middle of the town. It's the center of the place architecturally. It should be the center of the place spiritually too. But it's not. No. That little tin-pot shack of a cinema they're going to tonight has more influence on the lives of people here than the church.

• Rev. Martin Gregory : A fine caricature I've made of religion if that's how it seems to me own children. Should be because of religion I have more sympathy and understanding for people. But I have, Margaret, I have. Do I seem the type of man that'd turn away from the sorrows of his own children?

• Aunt Lydia : I always think Christmas is the loveliest of the festivals.

  Rev. Martin Gregory : Do you know I hate it?

  Aunt Lydia : But Martin, *why*?

  Rev. Martin Gregory : Ah, the brewers and the retail traders have got hold of it. It's all eating and drinking and giving each other knickknacks. Nobody remembers the birth of Christ.

• Rev. Martin Gregory : [addressing Margaret]  You know, that's the trouble with your generation. You must see and touch before you can believe. Well, can you touch the wind? St. Augustine said that. Now, you're clever. You're intelligent. But you frighten yourself with words. Ah! People don't know what they want half the time. More money, they think, or more power. Or just another drink, perhaps. Or another wife, or another lover... Ah, but it's none of these things, because even when they have them, there's still something they want, and they don't know what it is. And they go on wanting something and not knowing what it is. And that is the root of all the religions in the world.