"even when it didn't raise its practice to its preaching, it never lowered its preaching to its practice."

"No matter how morally bad the Church had gotten in the Renaissance, it never taught heresy. I was impressed with its very hypocrisy: even when it didn't raise its practice to its preaching, it never lowered its preaching to its practice. Hypocrisy, someone said, is the tribute vice pays to virtue."

Peter Kreeft, "Hauled aboard the ark: the spiritual journey of Peter Kreeft."  From "Hauled aboard the ark," in Spiritual journeys: twenty-seven men and women share their faith experiences, ed. Robert Baram (Boston, MA:  Pauline Books & Media, 1987), 174-175 (165-178).  But is this true (of the Church, at least)?  I must read Noonan and others on the Church that (supposedly) can and cannot change.