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00702fb "Some say," Scytale said, "that people cling to Imperial leadership because space is infinite. They feel lonely without a unifying symbol. For a lonely people, the Emperor is a definite place. They can turn toward him and say: 'See, there He is. He makes us one.' Perhaps religion serves the same purpose, m'Lord." emperor religion scytale Frank Herbert
a853662 I'm going to rub your faces in things you try to avoid. I don't find it strange that all you want to believe is only that which comforts you. How else do humans invent the traps which betray us into mediocrity? How else do we define cowardice? cowardice mediocrity priest religion Frank Herbert
03dcee8 Modern Romans insisted that there was only one god, a notion that struck Alobar as comically simplistic. Worse, this Semitic deity was reputed to be jealous (what was there to be jealous of if there were no other gods?), vindictive, and altogether foul-tempered. If you didn't serve the nasty fellow, the Romans would burn your house down. If you did serve him, you were called a Christian and got to burn other people's houses down. christianity gods jealousy religion romans vindication Tom Robbins
29db738 In the pragmatist, streetwise climate of advanced postmodern capitalism, with its scepticism of big pictures and grand narratives, its hard-nosed disenchantment with the metaphysical, 'life' is one among a whole series of discredited totalities. We are invited to think small rather than big - ironically, at just the point when some of those out to destroy Western civilization are doing exactly the opposite. In the conflict between Western capitalism and radical Islam, a paucity of belief squares up to an excess of it. The West finds itself faced with a full-blooded metaphysical onslaught at just the historical point that it has, so to speak, philosophically disarmed. As far as belief goes, postmodernism prefers to travel light: it has beliefs, to be sure, but it does not have faith. belief capitalism faith grand-narratives islam islamic-fundamentalism islamic-terrorism islamism life metaphysics philosophical-scepticism philosophy postmodernism pragmatism religion western-culture western-world Terry Eagleton
fa48200 Religions and states and classes and tribes and nations do not have to work or argue for their adherents and subjects. They more or less inherit them. Against this unearned patrimony there have always been speakers and writers who embody Einstein's injunction to 'remember your humanity and forget the rest.' It would be immodest to claim membership in this fraternity/sorority, but I hope not to have done anything to outrage it. Despite the idiotic sneer that such principles are 'fashionable,' it is always the ideas of secularism, libertarianism, internationalism, and solidarity that stand in need of reaffirmation. atheism internationalism libertarianism politics religion secularism social-class Christopher Hitchens
4c89068 My fear was not the fear of God but, as in the case of the whole Turkish secular bourgeoisie, fear of the anger of those who believe in God too zealously(...) I experienced the guilt complex as something personal, originated less from the fear of distancing myself from God than from distancing myself from the sense of community shared by the entire city . religion Orhan Pamuk
8c86c38 One notorious named Hiwa al-Balkhi, writing in ninth-century Persia, offered two hundred awkward questions to the faithful. He drew upon himself the usual thunderous curses--'may his name be forgotten, may his bones be worn to nothing'--along with detailed refutations and denunciations by Abraham ibn Ezra and others. These exciting anathemas, of course, ensured that his worrying 'questions' would remain current for as long as the Orthodox commentaries would be read. In this way, rather as when Maimonides says that the Messiah will come but that 'he may tarry,' Jewishness contrives irony at its own expense. If there is one characteristic of Jews that I admire, it is that irony is seldom if ever wasted on them. atheism curses heretics hiwi-al-balkhi irony jewishness jews judaism maimonides messiah orthodox-judaism religion self-deprecation Christopher Hitchens
d182639 The year showed me beyond a doubt that everyone practices cafeteria religion... But the important lesson was this: there's nothing wrong with choosing. Cafeterias aren't bad per se... the key is in choosing the right dishes. You need to pick the nurturing ones (compassion), the healthy ones (love thy neighbor), not the bitter ones. choice religion A.J. Jacobs
4dd1994 "The basic recurring theme in Hindu mythology is the creation of the world by the self-sacrifice of God--"sacrifice" in the original sense of "making sacred"--whereby God becomes the world which, in the end, becomes again God. This creative activity of the Divine is called lila, the play of God, and the world is seen as the stage of the divine play. Like most of Hindu mythology, the myth of lila has a strong magical flavour. Brahman is the great magician who transforms himself into the world and then performs this feat with his "magic creative power", which is the original meaning of maya in the Rig Veda. The word maya--one of the most important terms in Indian philosophy--has changed its meaning over the centuries. From the might, or power, of the divine actor and magician, it came to signify the psychological state of anybody under the spell of the magic play. As long as we confuse the myriad forms of the divine lila with reality, without perceiving the unity of Brahman underlying all these forms, we are under the spell of maya. (...) In the Hindu view of nature, then, all forms are relative, fluid and ever-changing maya, conjured up by the great magician of the divine play. The world of maya changes continuously, because the divine lila is a rhythmic, dynamic play. The dynamic force of the play is karma, important concept of Indian thought. Karma means "action". It is the active principle of the play, the total universe in action, where everything is dynamically connected with everything else. In the words of the Gita Karma is the force of creation, wherefrom all things have their life." hinduism life religion Fritjof Capra
1a71071 "The Bible may be an arresting and good religion sicence Richard Dawkins
7060cb4 mn lbdyhy 'nh l t`y hdhh lHqyq@, whdh shy mfhwm: flhdf ldhy nlHqh mHjwb `n dy'man . . Hyn trGb ft@ shb@ fy lzwj fhy trGb fy shy tjhlh tmman. wlshb ldhy yrkD wr lmjd l ymlk 'dn~ fkr@ `n lmjd. ldhlk, fn lshy ldhy y`Ty m`n~ ltSrftn shy njhlh tmman. sbyn 'yDan tjhl m hw lhdf mn rGbth fy lkhyn@. 'ykwn lhdf mnh lwSwl l~ lkhf@ Gyr lmHtml@ llky'n? mndh rHylh `n jnyf why tqtrb 'kthr f'kthr mn hdh lhdf. friedrich-nietzche friedrich-nietzsche love milan-kundera neitzsche novel philosophy philosophy-of-life political psychological psychology religion religion-and-philoshophy sex sociology اجتماع جنس حب علم-نفس فلسفة فلسفة-حياة كائن-لا-تحتمل-خفته ميلان-كونديرا نيتشه ميلان كونديرا
9df68c2 There is an incessant influx of novelty into the world, and yet we tolerate incredible dulness. I need only suggest what kind of sermons are still listened to in the most enlightened countries. There are such words as joy and sorrow, but they are only the burden of a psalm, sung with a nasal twang, while we believe in the ordinary and mean. religion routine Henry David Thoreau
21adac3 "To every Armageddonist, every earth lover must keep saying with all the sincerity and affection we can muster, "May God make this world as beautiful to you as it has been to me." nature religion religious-freedom spirituality David James Duncan
fdd005a When a person assumes that his or her revelation is the only true one, it only says that this person has had very few religious revelations and hasn't realized how many there are. paganism religion wicca witchcraft Margot Adler
9aceb3a "Glenn used to say the reason you can't really imagine yourself being dead was that as soon as you say, "I'll be dead," you've said the word I, and so you're still alive inside the sentence. And that's how people got the idea of immortality of the soul - it was a consequence of grammar. And so was God, because as soon as there's a past tense, there has to be a past before the past, and you keep going back in time until you get to I don't know, and that's what God is. It's what you don't know - the dark, the hidden, the underside of the visible, and all because we have grammar, and grammar would be impossible without the FoxP2 gene; so God is a brain mutation, and that gene is the same one birds need for singing. So music is built in, Glenn said: It's knitted into us. It would be very hard to amputate it because it's an essential part of us, like water." religion scifi the-year-of-the-flood Margaret Atwood
8380362 Contrary to what the West seems to think, it is not poverty that brings people like us so close to God. It's the fact that no one is more curious than we are to learn why we are here on earth and what will happen to us in the next world. islam poverty religion Orhan Pamuk
e1b9d2e "New Rule: Death isn't always sad. This week, the Reverend Jerry Falwell died, and millions of Americans asked, "Why? Why, God? Why...didn't you take Pat Robertson with him?" I don't want to say Jerry was disliked by the gay community, but tonight in New York City, at exactly eight o'clock, Broadway theaters along the Great White Way turned their lights up for two minutes. I know you're not supposed to speak ill of the dead, but I think we can make an exception, because speaking ill of the dead was kind of Jerry Falwell's hobby. He's the guy who said AIDS was God's punishment for homosexuality and that 9/11 was brought on by pagans, abortionists, feminists, gays, and the ACLU--or, as I like to call them, my studio audience. It was surreal watching people on the news praise Falwell, followed by a clip package of what he actually said--things like: "Homosexuals are part of a vile and satanic system that will be utterly annihilated." "If you're not a born-again Christian, you're a failure as a human being." "Feminists just need a man in the house." "There is no separation of church and state." And, of course, everyone's favorite: "The purple Teletubby is gay." Jerry Falwell found out you could launder your hate through the cover of "God's will"--he didn't hate gays, God does. All Falwell's power came from name-dropping God, and gay people should steal that trick. Don't say you want something because it's your right as a human being--say you want it because it's your religion. Gay men have been going at things backward. Forget civil right, and just make gayness a religion. I mean, you're kneeling anyway. And it's easy to start a religion. Watch, I'll do it for you. I had a vision last night. The Blessed Virgin Mary came to me--I don't know how she got past the guards--and she told me it's time to take the high ground from the Seventh-day Adventists and give it to the twenty-four-hour party people. And that what happens in the confessional stays in the confessional. Gay men, don't say you're life partners. Say you're a nunnery of two. "We weren't having sex,officer. I was performing a very private mass.Here in my car. I was letting my rod and my staff comfort him." One can only hope that as Jerry Falwell now approaches the pearly gates, he is met there by God Himself, wearing a Fire Island muscle shirt and nut-hugger shorts, saying to Jerry in a mighty lisp, "I'm not talking to you." hate hate-speech humor ignorance jerry-falwell religion Bill Maher
69fd83a Women are also property in our bible; adultery is a property crime in the Old Testament, not a sex crime. bible history inequality infidelity marriage objectification objectification-of-women old-testament personhood property religion women Bill Maher
2461186 ybdw 'n fy ldmG mnTq@ khS@ tmman wymkn tsmyth b<>, why lty tsjWl kl l'shy lty sHrtn 'w lty j`ltn nnf`l 'mmh, wkl m y`Ty lHytn jmlh. mdh t`rWf twms l~ tyryz, lm y`d l'y mr'@ lHq fy 'n ttrk 'thran wlw `bran fy hdhh lmnTq@ mn dmGh. friedrich-nietzche friedrich-nietzsche love milan-kundera neitzsche novel philosophy philosophy-of-life political psychological psychology religion religion-and-philoshophy sex sociology اجتماع جنس حب علم-نفس فلسفة فلسفة-حياة كائن-لا-تحتمل-خفته ميلان-كونديرا نيتشه ميلان كونديرا
d56a178 But simple as the Sign of the Cross is, it carries a brave weight: it names the Trinity, celebrates the Creator, and brings home all the power of faith to the brush of fingers on skin and bone and belly. So do we, sometimes well and sometimes ill, labor to bring home our belief in God's love to the stuff of our daily lives, the skin and bone of this world -- and the Sign of the Cross helps us to remember that we have a Companion on the road. catholic catholicism christ christian christianity creator cross faith god god-s-love holy-trinity jesus jesus-christ love prayer religion sacramental sign-of-the-cross trinity Brian Doyle
fccf1da "Religious discourse was not intended to be understood literally because it was only possible to speak about a reality that transcended language in symbolic terms. The story of the lost paradise was a myth, not a factual account of a historical event. People were not expected to "believe" it in the abstract; like any mythos, it depended upon the rituals associated with the cult of a particular holy place to make what it signified a reality in the lives of participants. The same applies to the creation myth that was central to ancient religion and has now become controversial in the Western world because the Genesis story seems to clash with modern science. But until the early modern period, nobody read a cosmology as a literal account of the origins of life. In the ancient world, it was inspired by an acute sense of the contingency and frailty of existence. Why had anything come into being at all, when there could so easily have been nothing? There has never been a simple or even a possible answer to this question, but people continue to ask it, pushing their minds to the limit of what we can know." religion spirituality Karen Armstrong
a762a40 Patty believed that parents have a duty to teach their children how to recognize reality when they see it. page-81 parenting parents reality religion Jonathan Franzen
a2882c6 There is something distinctly odd about the argument, however. Believing is not something you can decide to do as a matter of policy. At least, it is not something I can decide to do as an act of will. I can decide to go to church and I can decide to recite the Nicene Creed, and I can decide to swear on a stack of bibles that I believe every word inside them. But none of that can make me actually believe it if I don't. Pascal's Wager could only ever be an argument for feigning belief in God. And the God that you claim to believe in had better not be of the omniscient kind or he'd see through the deception. belief god pascals-wager religion theology Richard Dawkins
3f6ce17 He's not a bad guy, John. It's human nature. He wanted it to be some mistake I made that he wouldn't have made, some flaw in me that he didn't share, so he could believe it wouldn't have happened to him. But it wasn't my fault. It was either blind, dumb, stupid luck from start to finish, in which case, we are all in the wrong business gentleman, or it was a God I cannot worship. religion Mary Doria Russell
66c00b5 Then every man would be as a god, you see. The result of this, of course, would be that there would no longer be any gods, only men. We would give them knowledge of the sciences and the arts, which we possess, and in so doing we would destroy their simple faith and remove all basis for their hoping that things will be better--for the best way to destroy faith or hope is to let it be realized. faith hope magick religion Roger Zelazny
b51a753 I never used to realize it, I guess. I try and play it along and just not make trouble for people. Probably I never would have had any trouble at all if I hadn't run into Brett when they shipped me to England. I suppose she only wanted what she couldn't have. Well, people were that way. To hell with people. The Catholic Church had an awfully good way of handling all that. Good advice, anyway. Not to think about it. Oh, it was swell advice. Try and take it sometime. Try and take it. religion self-image sexuality Ernest Hemingway
12802ff Gods didn't mind atheists, if they were deep, hot, fiery, atheists like Simony, who spend their whole life hating gods for not existing. That sort of atheism was a rock. It was nearly belief ... belief discworld religion small-gods terry-pratchett Terry Pratchett
23bbae4 "I'm a religious man," he said. "I don't believe in a particular God, but even so one can have a faith, something beyond the limits of rationality. Marxism has a large element of built-in faith, although it claims to be a science and not merely an ideology. This is my first visit to the West: until now I have only been able to go to the Soviet Union or Poland or the Baltic states. In your country I see an abundance of material things. It seems to be unlimited. But there's a difference between our countries that is also a similarity. Both are poor. You see, poverty has different faces. We lack the abundance that you have, and we don't have the freedom of choice. In your country I detect a kind of poverty, which is that you do not need to fight for your survival. For me the struggle has a religious dimension, and I would not want to exchange that for your abundance." poverty religion Henning Mankell
b08bdc5 kn bmkn anW 'n tnhy Hyth bTryq@ 'khr~ mkhtlf@ tmman. wlkn Hfz lmHT@ wlmwt, hdh lHfz ldhy l yuns~ lqtrnh bbdy@ lHb, kn yjdhbh fy lHZt ly's, bjmlh lqy'm. flnsn ynsj Hyth `l~ Gyr `lm mnh wfqan lqwnyn ljml Ht~ fy lHZt ly's l'kthr qtm@. l ymkn dhan 'n y'khdh 'Hd `l~ rwy@ fttnh bltfq lGmD llSdf. (mthlan, tlqy frwnsky wanW wlrSyf wlmwt 'w tlqy bythwvn wtwms wtyryz wk's lkwnyk). lkn ymkn 'n yw'khdh biHqinW `l~ lnsn Hyn yu`my `ynyh `n hdhh lSdf fyHrm bltly Hyth mn bu`d ljml. friedrich-nietzche friedrich-nietzsche love milan-kundera neitzsche novel philosophy philosophy-of-life political psychological psychology religion religion-and-philoshophy sex sociology اجتماع جنس حب علم-نفس فلسفة فلسفة-حياة كائن-لا-تحتمل-خفته ميلان-كونديرا نيتشه ميلان كونديرا
a3524c8 Both the mentally healthy and the neurotic are driven by the need to find an answer [to the problem of human existence], the only difference being that one answer corresponds more to the total needs of man, and hence is more conducive to the unfolding of his powers and to his happiness than the other. All cultures provide for a patterned system in which certain solutions are predominant, hence certain strivings and satisfactions.... The deviate from the cultural pattern is just as much in search of an answer as his more well-adjusted brother. His answer may be better or worse than the one given by his culture - it is always another answer to the same fundamental question raised by human existence. In this sense all cultures are religious and every neurosis is a private form of religion, provided we mean by religion an attempt to answer the problem of human existence. individual meaning neurosis problem-of-human-existence religion society Erich Fromm
7af5990 'thn lnhr, knt tyryz tHwl jhd@ (lkn dwn 'n ttmkn f`lan) l'n tSdq m yqwlh twms w'n tkwn s`yd@ km f`lt Ht~ lan. Gyr 'n lGyr@ lmkbwt@ fy lnhr knt tZhr bshkl 'kthr `nfan fy 'Hlmh lty tnthy dy'man bnHyb l ynqT` l Hyn ywqZh twms. knt 'Hlmh ttkrr `l~ shkl Hlqt mtnw`@ 'w mslslin tlfzywny. thm@ Hlw kn ytkrr bstmrr `l~ sbyl lmthl, whw Hlm lhrr@ lty tqfz l~ wjhh munshb@ mkhlbh fy jldh. fy lHqyq@ ymkn tfsyr hdh lHlm bshwl@: lhr@ fy llG@ ltshyky@ klm@ `my@ t`ny ft@ jmyl@. knt tyryz dhan tsh`r 'nh mhdd@ mn lns, kl lns. flns kluWhn `shyqt mHtmlt ltwms wlhdh fhy tkhf mnhn. friedrich-nietzche friedrich-nietzsche love milan-kundera neitzsche novel philosophy philosophy-of-life political psychological psychology religion religion-and-philoshophy sex sociology اجتماع جنس حب علم-نفس فلسفة فلسفة-حياة كائن-لا-تحتمل-خفته ميلان-كونديرا نيتشه ميلان كونديرا
31f031c You can tell people the truth, but they'll never believe until the event. Until it's too late. In the meantime, the truth will just piss them off and get you in a lot of trouble faith religion truth Chuck Palahniuk
e1941b7 Religion is tied to the deepest feelings people have. The love that arises from that stewing pot is the sweetest and strongest, but the hate is the hottest, and the anger is the most violent. love philosophy religion Orson Scott Card
92968b0 Girls aside, the other thing I found in the last few years of being at school, was a quiet, but strong Christian faith - and this touched me profoundly, setting up a relationship or faith that has followed me ever since. I am so grateful for this. It has provided me with a real anchor to my life and has been the secret strength to so many great adventures since. But it came to me very simply one day at school, aged only sixteen. As a young kid, I had always found that a faith in God was so natural. It was a simple comfort to me: unquestioning and personal. But once I went to school and was forced to sit through somewhere in the region of nine hundred dry, Latin-liturgical, chapel services, listening to stereotypical churchy people droning on, I just thought that I had got the whole faith deal wrong. Maybe God wasn't intimate and personal but was much more like chapel was ... tedious, judgemental, boring and irrelevant. The irony was that if chapel was all of those things, a real faith is the opposite. But somehow, and without much thought, I had thrown the beautiful out with the boring. If church stinks, then faith must do, too. The precious, natural, instinctive faith I had known when I was younger was tossed out with this newly found delusion that because I was growing up, it was time to 'believe' like a grown-up. I mean, what does a child know about faith? It took a low point at school, when my godfather, Stephen, died, to shake me into searching a bit harder to re-find this faith I had once known. Life is like that. Sometimes it takes a jolt to make us sit and remember who and what we are really about. Stephen had been my father's best friend in the world. And he was like a second father to me. He came on all our family holidays, and spent almost every weekend down with us in the Isle of Wight in the summer, sailing with Dad and me. He died very suddenly and without warning, of a heart attack in Johannesburg. I was devastated. I remember sitting up a tree one night at school on my own, and praying the simplest, most heartfelt prayer of my life. 'Please, God, comfort me.' Blow me down ... He did. My journey ever since has been trying to make sure I don't let life or vicars or church over-complicate that simple faith I had found. And the more of the Christian faith I discover, the more I realize that, at heart, it is simple. (What a relief it has been in later life to find that there are some great church communities out there, with honest, loving friendships that help me with all of this stuff.) To me, my Christian faith is all about being held, comforted, forgiven, strengthened and loved - yet somehow that message gets lost on most of us, and we tend only to remember the religious nutters or the God of endless school assemblies. This is no one's fault, it is just life. Our job is to stay open and gentle, so we can hear the knocking on the door of our heart when it comes. The irony is that I never meet anyone who doesn't want to be loved or held or forgiven. Yet I meet a lot of folk who hate religion. And I so sympathize. But so did Jesus. In fact, He didn't just sympathize, He went much further. It seems more like this Jesus came to destroy religion and to bring life. This really is the heart of what I found as a young teenager: Christ comes to make us free, to bring us life in all its fullness. He is there to forgive us where we have messed up (and who hasn't), and to be the backbone in our being. Faith in Christ has been the great empowering presence in my life, helping me walk strong when so often I feel so weak. It is no wonder I felt I had stumbled on something remarkable that night up that tree. I had found a calling for my life. faith religion Bear Grylls
c949cbc Religion and ethics were not always - or even frequently - mutually compatible. The demands of religious absolutism or fundamentalism or rampaging relativism often deflected the worst aspects of contemporary culture or prejudices rather than a system which both man and God could live under with a sense of real justice. ethics religion Dan Simmons
6f1fd40 Actually I am a Christian, and indeed a Roman Catholic, so that I do not expect 'history' to be anything but a 'long defeat' - though it contains (and in a legend may contain more clearly and movingly) some samples or glimpses of final victory. (Letter #195) catholic-spirituality religion J.R.R. Tolkien
ea2418e Money has no religion except itself. religion Louis de Bernières
eafd425 I'm Sorry,' he says. It's simple and direct, with none of the nonsense about God calling home an angel too young and who are we to question his mysterious ways. religion Libba Bray
f927496 There would be no more offerings. Not this day. Not any day. Humankind had suffered enough for its love of gods, its long search for God. He thought of the many centuries in which his people, the Jews, had negotiated with God, complaining, bickering, decrying the unfairness of things but always - always - returning to obedience at whatever the cost. Generations dying in the ovens of hatred. Future generations scarred by the cold fires of radiation and renewed hatred. hatred obedience religion searching suffering Dan Simmons
c63516c "The other day as I was stepping out of Star Grocery on Claremont Avenue with some pork ribs under my arm, the Berkeley sky cloudless, a smell of jasmine in the air, a car driving by with its window rolled down, trailing a sweet ache of the Allman Brothers' "Melissa," it struck me that in order to have reached only the midpoint of my life I will need to live to be 92. That's pretty old. If you live to be ninety-two, you've done well for yourself. I'd like to be optimistic, and I try to take care of my health, but none of my grandparents even made it past 76, three killed by cancer, one by Parkinson's disease. If I live no longer than any of them did, I have at most thirty years left, which puts me around sixty percent of the way through my time. death mortality religion soul Michael Chabon
d560208 "Two men who had never seen each other before and would not likely see each other again. But their sincerity and sweetness, their sharing an instant in a fleeting life. It was almost as if a secret had passed between them. Was this some kind of love? I wanted to follow them, to touch them, to tell them of my happiness. I wanted to whisper to them: 'This is it. This is it'"." religion science-fiction universe Alan Lightman
0bee3e0 The fact that it has nothing else to contribute to human wisdom is no reason to hand religion a free licence to tell us what to do. Which religion, anyway? The one in which we happen to have been brought up? To which chapter, then, of which book of the Bible should we turn--for they are far from unanimous and some of them are odious by any reasonable standards. How many literalists have read enough of the Bible to know that the death penalty is prescribed for adultery, for gathering sticks on the sabbath and for cheeking your parents? If we reject Deuteronomy and Leviticus (as all enlightened moderns do), by what criteria do we then decide which of religion's moral values to accept? Or should we pick and choose among all the world's religions until we find one whose moral teaching suits us? If so, again we must ask, by what criterion do we choose? And if we have independent criteria for choosing among religious moralities, why not cut out the middle man and go straight for the moral choice without the religion? religion theology Richard Dawkins
574fbf7 You are all misleading one another, and are yourselves deceived. The sun does not go round the earth, but the earth goes round the sun, revolving as it goes, and turning towards the sun in the course of each twenty-four hours, not only Japan, and the Philippines, and Sumatra where we now are, but Africa, and Europe, and America, and many lands besides. The sun does not shine for some one mountain, or for some one island, or for some one sea, nor even for one earth alone, but for other planets as well as our earth. If you would only look up at the heavens, instead of at the ground beneath your own feet, you might all understand this, and would then no longer suppose that the sun shines for you, or for your country alone. religion the-universe Leo Tolstoy
18e0b76 "I know that a stranger's hand will write to me next, to say that the good and faithful servant has been called at length into the joy of his Lord. And why weep for this? No fear of death will darken St. John's last hour: his mind will be unclouded; his heart will be undaunted; his hope will be sure; his faith steadfast. His own words are a pledge of this: "My Master," he says, "has forewarned me. Daily he announces more distinctly, 'Surely I come quickly!' and hourly I more eagerly respond, 'Amen; even so come, Lord Jesus!" inspirational religion Charlotte Brontë
d7c8c5c "...Both Elizabeth [Smart] and Ruby [Jessop] were fourteen when they were kidnapped, raped and "kept captive by polygamous fanatics." The main difference in the girls' respective ordeals...is that "Elizabeth was brainwashed for nine months," while Ruby had been brainwashed by polygamist fanatics "since birth." Despite the similarity of their plights, Elizabeth's abusers were jailed and charged with sexual assault, aggravated burglary, and aggravated kidnapping, while Ruby... "was returned to her abusers, no real investigation was done, no charges brought against anyone" involved." mormonism polygamy religion religion-and-children women-s-rights Jon Krakauer
a69efcf A new country seems to follow a pattern. First come the openers, strong and brave and rather childlike. They can take care of themselves in a wilderness, but they are naive and helpless against men, and perhaps that is why they went out in the first place. When the rough edges are worn off the new land, businessmen and lawyers come in to help with the development---to solve problems of ownership, usually by removing the temptations to themselves. And finally comes culture, which is entertainment, relaxation, transport out of the pain of living. And culture can be on any level, and is. The Church and the whorehouse arrived in the Far West simultaneously. religion sex John Steinbeck
e168922 The Islamic Reformation is already here. We are all living in it. religion Reza Aslan
ce1c303 She has committed great sins, but they've been forgiven, and that's why she loves so deeply. faith forgiveness god hope love mary-magdalene prostitution redemption religion second-chances Philip Pullman
4a6811b Journalism, look you, is the religion of modern society. journalism religion society Honoré de Balzac
c23ba20 Each cherry took about three seconds to eat. Three seconds to eat, but at least five years in the making. It seemed unfair to the hard-working cherry tree. The least I could do was to devote my attention to the cherry in those three seconds, really appreciate the tartness of the skin and the faint crunching sound when I bite down. I guess it's called mindfulness. Or being in the moment, or making the mundane sacred. Whatever it is, I'm doing it more. Like the ridiculously extended thank-you list for my hummus, the fruit taboo made me more aware of the whole cherry process, the seed, the soil, the five years of watering and waiting. That's the paradox: I thought religion would make me live with my head in the clouds, but as often as not, it grounds me in this world. attention cherries cherry-tree page-172 paradox religion sacred wisdom A.J. Jacobs
aaef0a6 The only power that can effect transformations of the order (of Jesus) is love. It remained for the 20th century to discover that locked within the atom is the energy of the sun itself. For this energy to be released, the atom must be bombarded from without. So too, locked in every human being is a store of love that partakes of the divine- the imago dei, image of god...And it too can be activated only through bombardment, in its case, love's bombardment. The process begins in infancy, where a mother's initially unilateral loving smile awakens love in her baby and as coordination develops, elicits its answering smile... A loving human being is not produced by exhortations, rules and threats. Love can only take root in children when it comes to them- initially and most importantly from nurturing parents. Ontogenetically speaking, love is an answering phenomenon. It is literally a response. parenting religion spirituality Huston Smith
1f993c8 "It comes as no surprise to find [Norman] Mailer embracing [in the book ] a form of Manicheanism, pitting the forces of light and darkness against each other in a permanent stand-off, with humanity as the battlefield. (When asked if Jesus is part of this battle, he responds rather loftily that he thinks it is a distinct possibility.) But it is at points like this that he talks as if all the late-night undergraduate talk sessions on the question of theism had become rolled into one. 'How can we not face up to the fact that if God is All-Powerful, He cannot be All-Good. Or She cannot be All-Good.' Mailer says that questions such as this have bedevilled 'theologians', whereas it would be more accurate to say that such questions, posed by philosophers, have attempted to put theologians out of business. A long exchange on the probability of reincarnation (known to Mailer sometimes as "karmic reassignment") manages to fall slightly below the level of those undergraduate talk sessions. The Manichean stand-off leads Mailer, in closing, to speculate on what God might desire politically and to say: 'In different times, the heavens may have been partial to monarchy, to communism, and certainly the Lord was interested in democracy, in capitalism. (As was the Devil!)' I think it was at this point that I decided I would rather remember Mailer as the author of capitalism communism democracy devil god good-and-evil jesus monarchy norman-mailer omnibenevolence omnipotence philosophy politics reincarnation religion theism theology Christopher Hitchens
90c01f9 Though he never actually joined it, he was close to some civilian elements of the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine, which was the most Communist (and in the rather orthodox sense) of the Palestinian formations. I remember Edward once surprising me by saying, and apropos of nothing: 'Do you know something I have never done in my political career? I have never publicly criticized the Soviet Union. It's not that I terribly sympathize with them or anything--it's just that the Soviets have never done anything to harm me, or us.' At the time I thought this a rather naive statement, even perhaps a slightly contemptible one, but by then I had been in parts of the Middle East where it could come as a blessed relief to meet a consecrated Moscow-line atheist-dogmatist, if only for the comparatively rational humanism that he evinced amid so much religious barking and mania. It was only later to occur to me that Edward's pronounced dislike of George Orwell was something to which I ought to have paid more attention. communism dflp dogmatism edward-said humanism liberation middle-east moscow orwell palestine palestinians politics rationality religion religious-extremism soviet-union Christopher Hitchens
6efbbea During the Bosnian war in the late 1990s, I spent several days traveling around the country with Susan Sontag and her son, my dear friend David Rieff. On one occasion, we made a special detour to the town of Zenica, where there was reported to be a serious infiltration of outside Muslim extremists: a charge that was often used to slander the Bosnian government of the time. We found very little evidence of that, but the community itself was much riven as between Muslim, Croat, and Serb. No faction was strong enough to predominate, each was strong enough to veto the other's candidate for the chairmanship of the city council. Eventually, and in a way that was characteristically Bosnian, all three parties called on one of the town's few Jews and asked him to assume the job. We called on him, and found that he was also the resident intellectual, with a natural gift for synthesizing matters. After we left him, Susan began to chortle in the car. 'What do you think?' she asked. 'Do you think that the only dentist and the only shrink in Zenica are Jewish also?' It would be dense to have pretended not to see her joke. bosnia bosnian-war city-councils croats david-rieff extremism humour intellectuals islamic-extremism jews muslims religion religious-extremism serbs sontag zealotry zenica Christopher Hitchens
9163dd5 I saw exactly one picture of Marx and one of Lenin in my whole stay, but it's been a long time since ideology had anything to do with it. Not without cunning, Fat Man and Little Boy gradually mutated the whole state belief system into a debased form of Confucianism, in which traditional ancestor worship and respect for order become blended with extreme nationalism and xenophobia. Near the southernmost city of Kaesong, captured by the North in 1951, I was taken to see the beautifully preserved tombs of King and Queen Kongmin. Their significance in F.M.-L.B. cosmology is that they reigned over a then unified Korea in the 14th century, and that they were Confucian and dynastic and left many lavish memorials to themselves. The tombs are built on one hillside, and legend has it that the king sent one of his courtiers to pick the site. Second-guessing his underling, he then climbed the opposite hill. He gave instructions that if the chosen site did not please him he would wave his white handkerchief. On this signal, the courtier was to be slain. The king actually found that the site was ideal. But it was a warm day and he forgetfully mopped his brow with the white handkerchief. On coming downhill he was confronted with the courtier's fresh cadaver and exclaimed, 'Oh dear.' And ever since, my escorts told me, the opposite peak has been known as 'Oh Dear Hill.' I thought this was a perfect illustration of the caprice and cruelty of absolute leadership, and began to phrase a little pun about Kim Jong Il being the 'Oh Dear Leader,' but it died on my lips. absolutism caprice communism confucianism cruelty farce ideology karl-marx kim-il-sung kim-jong-il korea nationalism north-korea queen-noguk religion tomb-of-king-kongmin totalitarianism veneration-of-the-dead vladimir-lenin xenophobia Christopher Hitchens
e24bd1c It can certainly be misleading to take the attributes of a movement, or the anxieties and contradictions of a moment, and to personalize or 'objectify' them in the figure of one individual. Yet ordinary discourse would be unfeasible without the use of portmanteau terms--like 'Stalinism,' say--just as the most scrupulous insistence on historical forces will often have to concede to the sheer personality of a Napoleon or a Hitler. I thought then, and I think now, that Osama bin Laden was a near-flawless personification of the mentality of a real force: the force of Islamic jihad. And I also thought, and think now, that this force absolutely deserves to be called evil, and that the recent decapitation of its most notorious demagogue and organizer is to be welcomed without reserve. Osama bin Laden's writings and actions constitute a direct negation of human liberty, and vent an undisguised hatred and contempt for life itself. adolf-hitler cults-of-personality death-of-osama-bin-laden evil history islam islamism jihad liberty napoleon osama-bin-laden religion september-11-attacks stalinism terrorism theocracy Christopher Hitchens
f486b09 One of the questions asked by al-Balkhi, and often repeated to this day, is this: Why do the children of Israel continue to suffer? My grandmother Dodo thought it was because the were jealous. The seder for Passover (which is a shame-faced simulacrum of a Hellenic question-and-answer session, even including the wine) tells the children that it's one of those things that happens to every Jewish generation. After the or or Holocaust, many rabbis tried to tell the survivors that the immolation had been a punishment for 'exile,' or for insufficient attention to the Covenant. This explanation was something of a flop with those whose parents or children had been the raw material for the 'proof,' so for a time the professional interpreters of god's will went decently quiet. This interval of ambivalence lasted until the war of 1967, when it was announced that the divine purpose could be discerned after all. How wrong, how foolish, to have announced its discovery prematurely! The exile and the Shoah could now both be understood, as part of a heavenly if somewhat roundabout scheme to recover the Western Wall in Jerusalem and other pieces of biblically mandated real estate. I regard it as a matter of self-respect to spit in public on rationalizations of this kind. (They are almost as repellent, in their combination of arrogance, masochism, and affected false modesty, as Edith Stein's 'offer' of her life to expiate the regrettable unbelief in Jesus of her former fellow Jews.) The sage Jews are those who have put religion behind them and become in so many societies the leaven of the secular and the atheist. arrogance atheism bible biblical-covenant children christianity divine-retribution edith-stein exile false-modesty gentiles grandmothers hellenism hiwi-al-balkhi holocaust jealousy jerusalem jesus judaism martyrdom masochism passover passover-seder punishment rabbis rationalisation religion secularism self-respect six-day-war suffering survivors theodicy war western-wall will-of-god wine Christopher Hitchens
9fb703a Sunday was the normal day for the political awareness session at sea. Ordinarily Putin would have officiated, reading some Pravada editorials, followed by selected quotations from the works of Lenin and a discussion of the lessons to be learned from the readings. It is very much like a church service. religion Tom Clancy
b995b22 That's because they don't know,' said Tyburn. 'It's like economics. Everybody's got a theory, and some people make it their religion. religion Ben Aaronovitch
3cd83de "At Abraham's burial, his two most prominent sons, rivals since before they were born, estranged since childhood, scions of rival nations, come together for the first time since they were rent apart nearly three-quarters of a century earlier. The text reports their union nearly without comment. "His sons Isaac and Ishmael buried him in the cave of Machpelah, in the field of Ephron son of Zohar the Hittite, facing Mamre, in the field that Abraham had bought from the Hittites." But the meaning of this moment cannot be diminished. Abraham achieves in death what he could never achieve in life: a moment of reconciliation between his two sons, a peaceful, communal, side-by-side flicker of possibility in which they are not rivals, scions, warriors, adversaries, children, Jews, Christians, or Muslims. They are brothers. They are mourners. In a sense they are us, forever weeping for the loss of our common father, shuffling through our bitter memories, reclaiming our childlike expectations, laughing, sobbing, furious and full of dreams, wondering about our orphaned future, and demanding the answers we all crave to hear: What did you want from me, Father? What did you leave me with, Father? And what do I do now?" -- faith grief interfaith religion Bruce Feiler
3096657 qlt: <>. friedrich-nietzche friedrich-nietzsche love milan-kundera neitzsche novel philosophy philosophy-of-life political psychological psychology religion religion-and-philoshophy sex sociology اجتماع جنس حب علم-نفس فلسفة فلسفة-حياة كائن-لا-تحتمل-خفته ميلان-كونديرا نيتشه ميلان كونديرا
525ef59 zd `l~ dhlk 'n hdhh l'Hlm, l~ fSHth, knt jmyl@. lqd 'Gfl frwyd hdh ljnb fy nZryth `n l'Hlm. flHlm lys fqT blGan (blGan mrmwzan `nd lqtD) bl hw 'yDan nshT jmly wl`b@ llkhyl. whdhh ll`b@ hy bHd dhth qym@. flHlm hw lbrhn `l~ 'n ltkhyl wtSwWr m lys lh wjwd, hw Hd~ lHjt l'ssy@ llnsn, whn ykmn 'Sl lkhTr lkhd` lkmn fy lHlm. flw 'n lHlm lys jmylan, l'mknn nsynh bshwl@. ldhlk, knt tyryz trj` bstmrr l~ 'Hlmh wt`ydh fy mkhylth wtkhtlq mnh 'sTyr. 'mW twms fkn y`ysh fy knf lsHr lmnwWm, sHr ljml l'lym l'Hlm tyryz. friedrich-nietzche friedrich-nietzsche love milan-kundera neitzsche novel philosophy philosophy-of-life political psychological psychology religion religion-and-philoshophy sex sociology اجتماع جنس حب علم-نفس فلسفة فلسفة-حياة كائن-لا-تحتمل-خفته ميلان-كونديرا نيتشه ميلان كونديرا
8fa5997 "New Rule: You don't have to teach both sides of a debate if one side is a load of crap. President Bush recently suggested that public schools should teach "intelligent design" alongside the theory of evolution, because after all, evolution is "just a theory." Then the president renewed his vow to "drive the terrorists straight over the edge of the earth." Here's what I don't get: President Bush is a brilliant scientist. He's the man who proved you could mix two parts booze with one part cocaine and still fly a jet fighter. And yet he just can't seem to accept that we descended from apes. It seems pathetic to be so insecure about your biological superiority to a group of feces-flinging, rouge-buttocked monkeys that you have to make up fairy tales like "We came from Adam and Eve," and then cover stories for Adam and Eve, Yeah, leaving the earth in the hands of two naked teenagers, that's a real intelligent design. I'm sorry, folks, but it may very well be that life is just a series of random events, and that there is no master plan--but enough about Iraq. There aren't necessarily two sides to every issue. If there were, the Republicans would have an opposition party. And an opposition party would point out that even though there's a debate in schools and government about this, there is no debate among scientists. Evolution is supported by the entire scientific community. Intelligent design is supported by the guys on line to see And the reason there is no real debate is that intelligent design isn't real science. It's the equivalent of saying that the Thermos keeps hot things hot and cold things cold because it's a god. It's so willfully ignorant you might as well worship the U.S. mail. "It came again! Praise Jesus!" Stupidity isn't a form of knowing things. Thunder is high-pressure air meeting low-pressure air--it's not God bowling. "Babies come from storks" is not a competing school of throught in medical school. We shouldn't teach both. The media shouldn't equate both. If Thomas Jefferson knew we were blurring the line this much between Church and State, he would turn over in his slave. As for me, I believe in evolution intelligent design. I think God designed us in his image, but I also think God is a monkey." creationism essay evolution george-w-bush intelligent-design politics religion science separation-of-church-and-state Bill Maher
d3da1de My main reason for scepticism about the Huxley/Sagan theory is that the human brain is demonstrably eager to see faces in random patterns, as we know from scientific evidence, on top of the numerous legends about faces of Jesus, or the Virgin Mary, or Mother Teresa, being seen on slices of toast, or pizzas, or patches of damp on a wall. This eagerness is enhanced if the pattern departs from randomness in the specific direction of being symmetrical. evidence evolution religion science sir-julian-huxley theory Richard Dawkins
750f7f6 If this dysfunctional family was the best Sodom had to offer by way of morals, some might begin to feel a certain sympathy with God and his judicial brimstone. religion Richard Dawkins
9eae4e2 The world will brin its condemnation. They may even put their sword behind it. But we know that the highest courst has already ruled in our favor. 'If God is for us, who can be against us?' (Romans 8:31) No one successfully If they reject us, he accepts us. If they hate us, he loves us. If they imprison us, he sets our spirits free. If they afflict us, he refines us by the fire. If they kill us, he makes it a passage to paradise. They cannot defeat us. Christ has died. Christ has risen. We are alive in him. And in him there is no condemnation. We are forgiven, and we are righteous. 'And the righteous are bold as a lion.' (Proverbs 28:1) religion John Piper
3ee0c55 "When you have faith in something a lot of other people believe then you a member of the church" said Ceas, "When you have faith in something nobody believes, then you a complete wacko" religion Orson Scott Card
3f3ad2d A priest's life is spent between question and answer-- or between a question and the attempt to answer it. The question is the summary of the spiritual life. religion Naguib Mahfouz
935e34c "Culturally, though not theologically, I'm a Christian. I was born a Protestant of the white Anglo-Saxon persuasion. And while I do love that great teacher of peace who was called Jesus, and while I do reserve the right to ask myself in certain trying situations what indeed He would do, I can't swallow that one fixed rule of Christianity insisting that Christ is the only path to God. Strictly speaking, then, I cannot call myself a Christian. Most of the Christians I know accept my feelings on this with grace and open-mindedness. Then again, most of the Christians I know don't speak very strictly. To those who do speak (and think) strictly, all I can do here is offer my regrets for any hurt feelings and now excuse myself from their business. "Traditionally, I have responded to the transcendent mystics of all religions. I have always responded with breathless excitement to anyone who has ever said that God does not live in a dogmatic scripture or in a distant throne in the sky, but instead abides very close to us indeed--much closer than we can imagine, breathing right through our own hearts. I respond with gratitude to anyone who has ever voyaged to the center of that heart, and who has then returned to the world with a report for the rest of us that God is an experience of supreme love. In every religious tradition on earth, there have always been mystical saints and transcendents who report exactly this experience. Unfortunately many of them have ended up arrested and killed. Still, I think very highly of them. "In the end, what I have come to believe about God is simple. It's like this--I used to have this really great dog. She came from the pound. She was a mixture of about ten different breeds, but seemed to have inherited the finest features of them all. She was brown. When people asked me, "What kind of dog is that?" I would always give the same answer: "She's a brown dog." Similarly, when the question is raised, "What kind of God do you believe in?" my answer is easy: "I believe in a magnificent God" religion Elizabeth Gilbert
fe917fa Miracles prove nothing except to those whose faith is bought very cheap, sir. miracles religion Michael Chabon
2f53778 That God is in truth the sort of bloodthirsty paranoid Who would rend to bits forty-two children for the crime of sassing one of his priests. Don't ask me about the Front Office's policies; I just work here. god priests religion stranger-in-a-strange-land Robert A. Heinlein
b1a5bba I have no doubt that Jesus would actually practice the neighborliness he preached rather than following our example of religious supremacy, hostility, fear, isolation, misinformation, exclusion, or demonization. religion Brian D. McLaren
98a922c "They put spotlights on me standing there in the road in jeans and workclothes, with the big woeful rucksack a-back, and asked:-"Where are you going?" which is precisely what they asked me a year later under Television floodlights in New York, "Where are you going?"-Just as you cant explain to the police, you cant explain to society "Looking for peace." peace police religion society Jack Kerouac
c74a27c He did not wish to be divine. If there had never been a God, the emperor thought, it might have been easier to work out what goodness was. This business of worship, of the abnegation of self in the face of the Almighty, was a distraction, a false trail. Wherever goodness lay, it did not lie in ritual, unthinking obeisance before a deity but rather, perhaps, in the slow, clumsy, error-strewn working out of an individual or collective path. religion salman-rushdie Salman Rushdie
1ff72f5 THE PRESOCRATIC PROBLEM [all snap flags] Parmenides named his gun The Hot Power of the Stars. His gun was one, uncreated, imperishable, timeless, changeless, perfect, spherical. Spherical was the problem. philosophy poetry religion Anne Carson
7a9c449 ...Food serves two parallel purposes: it nourishes and it helps you remember. Eating and storytelling are inseparable--the saltwater is also tears; the honey not only tastes sweet, but makes us think of sweetness; the matzo is the bread of our affliction. family food mythology religion stories veganism vegetarianism Jonathan Safran Foer
14e2cc2 Nothing fucks up a religion like an intervention from a real God. intervention religion truth Christopher Moore
0f5e255 We stand hand-clasped, our faces quite blank, as if this were not a nightmare that tells me, as clearly as if it were written in letters of fire, what ending a girl may expect if she defies the rules of men and thinks she can make her own destiny. I am here not only to witness what happens to a heretic. I am here to witness what happens to a woman who thinks she knows more than men. fear history oppression religion witchhunt women-s-rights Philippa Gregory
bd730a0 These are illusions of popular history which successful religion must promote: Evil men never prosper; only the brave deserve the fair; honesty is the best policy; actions speak louder than words; virtue always triumpths; a good deed is its own rewards; any bad human can be reformed; religious talismans protect one from demon possession; only females understand the ancient mysteries; the rich are doomed to unhappiness belief-system belief-systems beliefs dune dune-arrakis dune-house-atreides dune-messiah evil evil-men faith falsehood falsehoods good goodness historical historical-perspective history history-of-mankind history-of-thought justice-of-god moral moral-law morality morals religion religion-philosophy religion-spirituality religions religious religious-faith virtue virtues Frank Herbert
0286498 "Jesus did not use hell to try and compel "heathens" and "pagans" to believe in God, so they wouldn't burn when they die. He talked about hell to very religious people to warn them about the consequences of straying from their God-given calling and identity to show the world God's love." jesus love religion Rob Bell
85b09dd Isn't it time we asked ourselves, are we willing to accept any behavior codified within religious or cultural practice? Is there no line to be drawn? If honor killings are okay, then why not virgin sacrifices or cannibalism or sex with children outside the church? We have perversely taken our notion of tolerance to such extremes that we've become tolerant of intolerance. intolerance religion religious-extremism tolerance Bill Maher
eb53768 My personal savior is common sense. And as far as God goes, I prefer to believe in one that would want me to use the excellent brain he gave us all. religion Bill Maher
347d2d8 For official record, if become bankrupt old retail distribution centers-labeled supermega, so-enlarged foodstuff market- later reincarnate to become worship shrine. First sell food-stuff, next then same structure sell battered furnitures, next now born as gymnasium club, next broker flea markets, only at final end of life...sell religions. pygmy religion super-markets Chuck Palahniuk
5534ad2 But perhaps the greatest attraction of Mormonism was the promise that each follower would be granted an extraordinarily intimate relationship with God. Joseph taught and encouraged his adherents to receive personal communiques straight from the Lord. Divine revelation formed the bedrock of the religion. history joseph-smith lds mormonism religion Jon Krakauer
7922b2c Because sometimes the Church seems like those posed circus tableaus where the curtain lifts and men, white, zinc-oxide, talcum-powder statues, freeze to represent abstract Beauty. Very wonderful. But I hope there will always be room for me to dart about among the statues, don't you, Father Stone? church clergy religion Ray Bradbury
df01335 Juanita believes that nothing is provably true or provably false in the Bible. Because if it's provably false, then the Bible is a lie, and if it's provably true, then the existence of God is proven and there's no room for faith. religion Neal Stephenson
d4e6d0e Compared to the unleashed forces of warfare and of faith, Mount Vesuvius was kinder to the legacy of antiquity. christianity faith religion war Stephen Greenblatt
e343b42 As a grandiose self-deception, war is o' the same magnitude as religion. We embrace war or religion - usually both at the same time - as a means o' defeatin' death, but neither o' them do a blinkin' thing but sanction dyin'. Throughout history, Death's best friend has been a priest with a knife. religion war Tom Robbins
e4fba6c [No single] explanation will ever contain the final answer for all time, for all hearers. There is always, ALWAYS more to learn. religion Orson Scott Card
dedc406 The neo-cons, or some of them, decided that they would back Clinton when he belatedly decided for Bosnia and Kosovo against Milosevic, and this even though they loathed Clinton, because the battle against religious and ethnic dictatorship in the Balkans took precedence. This, by the way, was partly a battle to save Muslims from Catholic and Christian Orthodox killers. That impressed me. The neo-cons also took the view, quite early on, that coexistence with Saddam Hussein was impossible as well as undesirable. They were dead right about that. They had furthermore been thinking about the menace of ism when most people were half-asleep. And then I have to say that I was rather struck by the way that the and its associated voices took the decision to get rid of Trent Lott earlier this year, thus removing an embarrassment as well as a disgrace from the political scene. And their arguments were on points of principle, not 'perception.' I liked their ruthlessness here, and their seriousness, at a time when much of the liberal Left is not even seriously wrong, but frivolously wrong, and babbles without any sense of responsibility. (I mean, have you their sub-Brechtian stuff on Halliburton....?) And revolution from above, in some states and cases, is--as I wrote in my book --often preferable to the status quo, or to no revolution at all. balkans bertolt-brecht bill-clinton bosnia bosnian-war catholicism christianity dictatorship ethnicity halliburton islam jihad kosovo kosovo-war leftism liberalism neoconservatism persecution persecution-of-muslims politics religion revolution saddam-hussein slobodan-milosevic the-weekly-standard trent-lott war Christopher Hitchens
1658adf You can live as a particle crashing about and colliding in a welter of materials with god, or you can live as a particle crashing about and colliding in a welter of materials without god. But you cannot live outside the welter of colliding materials. religion spirituality Annie Dillard
9f08e53 Bean was tired of talking about this. She looked so happy when she talked about God, but he hadn't figured it out yet, what God even was. It was like, she wanted to give God credit for every good thing, but when it was bad, then she either didn't mention God or had some reason why it was a good thing after all. As far as bean could see, though, the dead kids would rather have been alive, just with more food. If God loved them so much and he could do whatever he wanted, then why wasn't there more food for these kids? And if God just wanted them dead, why didn't he let them die sooner or not even be born at all, so they didn't have to go to so much trouble and get all excited about trying to be alive when he was just going to take them to his heart. None of it made any sense to Bean, and the more Sister Carlotta explained it, the less he understood it. Because if there was somebody in charge, then he ought to be fair, and if he wasn't fair, then why should Sister Carlotta be so happy that he was in charge? god religion suffering Orson Scott Card
2d6c166 kn ykhsh~ fy 'Glb l'Hyn 'n yjdh jls@ `l~ 'rD ldkn ldhy tshtry mnh lsjy'r. friedrich-nietzche friedrich-nietzsche love milan-kundera neitzsche novel philosophy philosophy-of-life political psychological psychology religion religion-and-philoshophy sex sociology اجتماع جنس حب علم-نفس فلسفة فلسفة-حياة كائن-لا-تحتمل-خفته ميلان-كونديرا نيتشه ميلان كونديرا
60b729b "I have often noticed that these things, which obsess me, neither bother nor impress other people even slightly. I am horribly apt to approach some innocent at a gathering, and like the ancient mariner, fix him with a wild, glitt'ring eye and say, "Do you know that in the head of the caterpillar of the ordinary goat moth there are two hundred twenty-eight separate muscles?" The poor wretch flees. I am not making chatter; I mean to change his life." beauty belief consciousness creation curiosity disbelief energy enoughness epiphany exploration exultant faith fate fearless fire free freedom gaps god grace growth hallelujah humility illumination intricacy joy joyful joyfulness life-force light living-in-the-present-moment mindfulness multiplicity mystery nature philosopher-s-stone philosophy poem poet poetry power praise prayer prayers praying religion religious-diversity science seeing seeking soul spirit stalking-the-gaps the-tree-with-the-lights-in-it tolerance walking watching wonder Annie Dillard
bf17eb2 Differ though we might with Christianity's view of what precisely our souls need, it is hard to discredit the provocative underlying thesis, which seems no less relevant in the secular realm than in the religious one--that we have within us a precious, childlike, vulnerable core which we should nourish and nurture on its turbulent journey through life. christianity life needs nourishment nurturing religion soul Alain de Botton
cdb619d lm tkn lrwH qdr@ `l~ shH@ bSrh `n shy'b@ lwld@ lmstdyr@ lsmr fwq l`n@ tmman; knt lrwH tr~ fy hdhh lshy'b@ khtman wsmt bh ljsd, wknt tjd 'n tHrk `Dw Gryb `l~ mqrb@ jdan mn hdh lkhtm lmqds, 'mr fyh tjdyf. friedrich-nietzche friedrich-nietzsche love milan-kundera neitzsche novel philosophy philosophy-of-life political psychological psychology religion religion-and-philoshophy sex sociology اجتماع جنس حب علم-نفس فلسفة فلسفة-حياة كائن-لا-تحتمل-خفته ميلان-كونديرا نيتشه ميلان كونديرا
21c1156 I realize that humans cannot bear very much reality. Most lives are a flight from selfhood. Most prefer the truths of the stable. You stick your heads into the stanchions and munch contentedly until you die. Others use you for their purposes. Not once do you live outside the stable to lift your head and be your own creature. Muad'Dib came to tell you about that. Without understanding his message, you cannot revere him! reality religion selfhood Frank Herbert
1e1dda3 Seven billion who need to be kept happy, and docile, until the end. How do you do that? What's the best way to calm down a scared kid, get them to go back to sleep? Tell them a story. Some shit about Jesus or whatever. delusion docile dying frightened funny happy jesus people population religion scared sleep story terrified terrifying truth Neal Stephenson
2b068df Submitting seemed to me a lot like giving up. If God gave us the strength to bail- the gumption to try and save ourselves- isn't that what he wanted us to do? god hard-work religion Jeannette Walls
a408a51 "It was made clear to me that I wasn't supposed to trouble the moody Creator with any pesky questions about the eccentricities of His cosmic system....Thus my idea of heaven was that I got to spend eternity sitting at the feet of God, grilling Him. "Let me get this straight," I'd say, by way of introduction. "It's your position that every person born has to suffer because Eve couldn't resist a healthy between-meals snack?" religion Sarah Vowell
8fec59b "Actually, the "leap of faith"--to give it the memorable name that Soren Kierkegaard bestowed upon it--is an imposture. As he himself pointed out, it is not a "leap" that can be made once and for all. It is a leap that has to go on and on being performed, in spite of mounting evidence to the contrary. This effort is actually too much for the human mind, and leads to delusions and manias. Religion understands perfectly well that the "leap" is subject to sharply diminishing returns, which is why it often doesn't in fact rely on "faith" at all but instead corrupts faith and insults reason by offering evidence and pointing to confected "proofs." This evidence and these proofs include arguments from design, revelations, punishments, and miracles. Now that religion's monopoly has been broken, it is within the compass of any human being to see these evidences and proofs as the feeble-minded inventions that they are." confected-proofs evidence faith leap-of-faith miracles religion revelations Christopher Hitchens
6d7fa8f People believe in God because they don't have any other explanation for things that happen. god religion Jodi Picoult
785a5ee "You were the one who threatened us with an Inquisitor," the Bishop reminded him. With a smile. The Speaker's smile was just as chilly. "And you're the one who told the people I was Satan and they shouldn't talk to me." religion Orson Scott Card
33325e0 The point is: what happens in heaven?' 'Unknowable wonderfulness?' 'Nonsense. The answer is nothing. Nothing can happen because if something happens, in fact if something can happen, then it doesn't represent eternity. Our lives are about development, mutation and the possibility of change; that is almost a definition of what life is: change.' 'If you disable change, if you effectively stop time, if you prevent the possibility of the alteration of an individual's circumstances - and that must include at least the possibility that they alter for the worse - then you don't have life after death; you just have death. heaven iain-m-banks look-to-windward religion Iain M. Banks
893abcf Accumulating orthodoxy makes it harder year-by-year to be a Christian than it was in Jesus' day. orthodoxy religion tradition Brian D. McLaren
d744849 But art and religion will always shadow one another through the abstract nouns they both invoke: truth, seriousness, imagination, sympathy, morality, transcendence. religion Julian Barnes
3300616 I know that you are wise. When you hear a true story, there is a part of you that responds to it regardless of art, regardless of evidence...You believe that the story is true, because you responded to it from that sense of truth deep within you. But that sense of truth does not respond to a story's factuality...[rather] to a story's causality - whether it faithfully shows the way the universe functions. mythology religion spirituality Orson Scott Card
273f28f God's voice is usually nothing more than a whisper, and you have to listen very carefully to hear it. But other times, in those rarest of moments, the answer is obvious and rings as loud as a church bell. epiphany god listen religion Nicholas Sparks
6904e8e The belief that the world was created yesterday seems to hold great appeal to those born at that time. creationism religion religious-fundamentalism science stupidity Gary Malone
4ceb9f3 "It's common knowledge that the "church" is nothing more than an invention of the priesthood designed to swindle the ordinary people of the empire out of just about everything they own." clergy organized-religion religion society David Eddings
ec90339 I don't . Religion? Humans desperate to take out infinity insurance. Death? The great big . Love? Dopamine released in the brain, which gets depleted over time, leaving contempt. death love religion Marisha Pessl
38c6b2b At times it may seem worse - harder, at least - to live through the despair of this loss without the temporary comfort of our addictive behaviour. We cannot drown our sorrows. We must face the fact that we don't know, really, where we are, how we got here, how long the pain will last, or how to move past it. That uncertainty may be the most painful part of not knowing a God: no one is there to reassure us that a God will take the pain and confusion away. We simply don't know. And we have no way to numb ourselves or to forget the condition we're in. religion spiritual Marya Hornbacher
2e57d33 "Suppose that we agree that the two atrocities can or may be mentioned in the same breath. Why should we do so? I wrote at the time ( , October 5, 1998) that Osama bin Laden 'hopes to bring a "judgmental" monotheism of his own to bear on these United States.' Chomsky's recent version of this is 'considering the grievances expressed by people of the Middle East region.' In my version, then as now, one confronts an enemy who wishes ill to our society, and also to his own (if impermeable religious despotism is considered an 'ill'). In Chomsky's reading, one must learn to sift through the inevitable propaganda and emotion resulting from the September 11 attacks, and lend an ear to the suppressed and distorted cry for help that comes, not from the victims, but from the perpetrators. I have already said how distasteful I find this attitude. I wonder if even Chomsky would now like to have some of his own words back? Why else should he take such care to quote himself deploring the atrocity? Nobody accused him of not doing so. It's often a bad sign when people defend themselves against charges which haven't been made." al-shifa-pharmaceutical-factory despotism emotion islam islamic-terrorism middle-east monotheism noam-chomsky osama-bin-laden propaganda religion september-11-attacks terrorism the-nation theocracy united-states war war-crimes Christopher Hitchens
9b32798 Life cannot find reasons to sustain it, cannot be a source of decent mutual regard, unless each of us resolves to breathe such qualities into it. ethics existentialism meaning-of-life mythology prophecy religion science-fiction Frank Herbert
62bbde3 Most discipline is hidden discipline, designed not to liberate but to limit. Do not ask Why? Be cautious with How? Why? leads inexorably to paradox. How? traps you in a universe of cause and effect. Both deny the infinite. religion science-fiction Frank Herbert
c4ad162 Some religions draw by force of arms; He would draw by force of love. The attraction would not be His words, but Himself. It was His Person around which His teaching centered; not His teaching around which He would be remembered. 'Greater love than this no man hath' - that was the secret of His magnetism. god jesus religion the-cross Fulton J. Sheen
88ef2b5 "Many things the gods achieve beyond our judgement,'" said the sorrowful girl. "'What we thought is not confirmed and what we thought not God contives." knowledge religion thought John Irving
bcdd734 "The old, endless, approachable and always answering Sorrow," says my father Lucifer. "For who calls on me never goes unanswered. Only prayers to God go without answers." -- religion Robert Nye
8c74860 To deny the necessity or value of metaphysics is to assert a metaphysical principle, just as to say a religion must be without dogmas is to assert a dogma. metaphysics philosophy religion Fulton J. Sheen
e8bc05d Holiness must have a philosophical and theological foundation, namely, Divine truth; otherwise it is sentimentality and emotionalism. Many would say later on, 'We want religion, but no creeds.' This is like saying we want healing, but no science of medicine; music, but no rules of music; history, but no documents. Religion is indeed a life, but it grows out of truth, not away from it. It has been said it makes no difference what you believe, it all depends on how you act. This is psychological nonsense, for a man acts out of his beliefs. Our Lord placed truth or belief in Him first; then came sanctification and good deeds. But here truth was not a vague ideal, but a Person. Truth was now lovable, because only a Person is lovable. Sanctity becomes the response the heart makes to Divine truth and its unlimited mercy to humanity. holiness jesus religion sanctification truth Fulton J. Sheen
bfe0d63 The German philosopher Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche, who had syphilis, said that only a person of deep faith could afford the luxury of religious skepticism. Humanists, by and large educated, comfortably middle-class persons with rewarding lives like mine, find rapture enough in secular knowledge and hope. Most people can't. religion Kurt Vonnegut
caa5d08 We reach in desperation beyond the fog, beyond the very stars, the voids of the universe are ransacked to justify the monster, and stamped with a human face. London is religions opportunity--not the decorous religion of theologians, but an anthropomorphic, crude. Yes, the continuous flow would be tolerable if a man of our own sort--not anyone pompous or tearful--were caring for us up in the sky. life religion truth E.M. Forster
930be32 "When I encountered these haunting words from Franz Kafka, I realized exactly why this light sermon about the search for God had struck such a nerve: "Everyday life is the greatest detective story ever written. Every second, without noticing, we pass by thousands of corpses and crimes. That's the routine of our lives." mystery religion Stephen Kendrick
0d9c061 "After Hiram Bingham built the first church on Oahu the student recalls, "When it was completed some of the natives said among themselves, 'That house of worship built by the haoles is a place in which they will pray us all to death. It is meant to kill us." god humor religion Sarah Vowell
fa63297 I thought of God as being able to talk big and write *very* small. religion John Hersey
493b254 The whole point of religious faith, its strength and chief glory, is that it does not depend on rational justification. The rest of us are expected to defend our prejudices. But ask a religious person to justify their faith and you infringe 'religious liberty'. faith prejudism rationality religion Richard Dawkins
7e039cb Moses Kaldor had always loved mountains; they made him feel nearer to the God whose nonexistence he still sometimes resented. nature religion Arthur C. Clarke
f4d8034 Why put yourself in charge of Heaven's cause? Does Heaven need our help to enforce its laws? hypocrisy religion Molière
315ea40 But doesn't that make sense? That the infinite would be, indeed... infinite? That even the most holy amongst us would only be able to see scattered pictures of the eternal picture at any given time? And that maybe if we could collect those pieces and compare them, a story about God would begin to emerge that resembles and includes everyone? religion Elizabeth Gilbert
2e97c30 In the end idealism annoyed Bouvard. 'I don't want any more of it: the famous cogito is a bore. The ideas of things are taken for the things themselves. What we barely understand is explained by means of words that we do not understand at all! Substance, extension, force, matter and soul, are all so many abstractions, figments of the imagination. As for God, it is impossible to know how he is, or even if he is! Once he was the cause of wind, thunder, revolutions. Now he is getting smaller. Besides, I don't see what use he is. god idealism language religion spirituality Gustave Flaubert
080da54 How would that premise stand up if he examined it? That was probably why the Communists were always cracking down on Bohemiansism. When you were drunk or when you committed adultery you recognised your own personal fallability of that so mutable substitute for the apostles' creed, the party line. Down with Bohemianism, the sin of Majakowski. communism drink morals religion Ernest Hemingway
18c8190 In the absence of organized religion, faith abounds, in the form of song and art and food and strong arms. faith food religion song Elizabeth Alexander
b0ba6d2 "You were baptized?" "My sister told me that yes, Father baptized me shortly after birth. My mother was a Protestant of a faith that deplored infant baptism, so they had a quarrel about it." The Bishop held out his hand to lift the Speaker to his feet. The Speaker chuckled. "Imagine. A closet Catholic and a lapsed Mormon, quarreling over religious procedures that they both claimed not to believe in." religion Orson Scott Card
d228558 I don't mean to defend zoos. Close them all down if you want (and let us hope that what wildlife remains can survive in what is left of the natural world). I know zoos are no longer in people's good graces. Religion faces the same problem. Certain illusion about freedom plague them both. illusion religion zoo Yann Martel
8e7cac9 This universe is shot through with mystery. The very fact of its being, and of our own, is a mystery absolute, and the only miracle worthy of the name. The consciousness that animates us is itself central to this mystery and the ground for any experience we might wish to call 'spiritual.' No myths need be embraced for us to commune with the profundity of our circumstance. No personal God need be worshiped for us to live in awe at the beauty and immensity of creation. No tribal fictions need be rehearsed for us to realize, one fine day, that we do, in fact, love our neighbors, that our happiness is inextricable from their own, and that our interdependence demands that people everywhere be given the opportunity to flourish. love mystery reason religion spirituality Sam Harris
dd55fa2 "As surely as I feel love and need for food and water, I feel love and need for God. But these feelings have nothing to do with Supramundane Males planning torments for those who don't abide by neocon "moral values." I hold the evangelical truth of our situation to be that contemporary politicized fundamentalists, including first and foremost those aimed at Empire and Armageddon, need us non-fundamentalists, mystics, ecosystem activists, unprogrammable artists, agnostic humanitarians, incorrigible writers, truth-telling musicians, incorruptible scientists, organic gardeners, slow food farmers, gay restaurateurs, wilderness visionaries, pagan preachers of sustainability, compassion-driven entrepreneurs, heartbroken Muslims, grief-stricken children, loving believers, loving disbelievers, peace-marching millions, and the One who loves us all in such a huge way that it is not going too far to say: they need us for their salvation." mystics peace religion salvation spirituality David James Duncan
385943b lqh btyryz kn HSyl@ Sdf st b`yd@ lHtml. lkn, khlfan ldhlk 'fl tqs 'hmy@ Hdth, wkthr@ m`nyh brtbTh b'kbr `dd mmkn mn lSdf? wHdh lSdf@ ymkn 'n tkwn dht mGz~. fm yHdth blDrwr@, m hw mtwq` wytkrr ywmyan ybq~ shyy'an 'bkm. wHdh lSdf@ nTq@. ns`~ l'n nqr' fyh km yqr' lGjrywn fy lrswm lty ykhTh thfl lqhw@ fy mqr lfnjn. friedrich-nietzche friedrich-nietzsche love milan-kundera neitzsche novel philosophy philosophy-of-life political psychological psychology religion religion-and-philoshophy sex sociology اجتماع جنس حب علم-نفس فلسفة فلسفة-حياة كائن-لا-تحتمل-خفته ميلان-كونديرا نيتشه ميلان كونديرا
aeb3e0c l 'Hd y`rf dhlk bSwr@ 'fDl mm y`rf lsysywn. fm 'n yrw al@ tSwyr `l~ mqrb@ mnhm Ht~ yhbuWw rkDyn thr 'wl Tfl ySdfwnh fyHmlwnh fy 'dhr`thm wyqblwnh fy khdh. <> hw lmthl l'`l~ lkl lsysyyn wlkl lHrkt lsysy@. friedrich-nietzche friedrich-nietzsche love milan-kundera neitzsche novel philosophy philosophy-of-life political psychological psychology religion religion-and-philoshophy sex sociology اجتماع جنس حب علم-نفس فلسفة فلسفة-حياة كائن-لا-تحتمل-خفته ميلان-كونديرا نيتشه ميلان كونديرا
9a8d877 j fy bdy@ sfr ltkwyn 'n llh khlq lnsn wj`lh ytslT `l~ lTywr wl'smk wlmshy@. bTby`@ lHl, lHq fy sfk dm 'yWlin 'w bqr@ hw lshy lwHyd ldhy tfqt `lyh lnsny@ jm` btakhin Ht~ khll lHrwb l'kthr dmwy@. qd ybdw ln hdh lHq bdyhyan l'nn n`tbr 'nfsn fy qm@ lslm. wlkn ykfy 'n ytdkhl shkhS shkhS thlth fy ll`b@, zy'r atin mthlan mn kwkb akhr wqd 'mrh llh: <>, ftSbH `ndy'dh bdh@ ltkwyn mwD` shk fy lHl friedrich-nietzche friedrich-nietzsche love milan-kundera neitzsche novel philosophy philosophy-of-life political psychological psychology religion religion-and-philoshophy sex sociology اجتماع جنس حب علم-نفس فلسفة فلسفة-حياة كائن-لا-تحتمل-خفته ميلان-كونديرا نيتشه ميلان كونديرا
e8d3e20 y`tbr tftysh lmwTnyn wmrqbthm mn lnshTt ljtm`y@ l'ssy@ wldy'm@ fy lbldn lshyw`y@. faliky ynl rsm HqWh fy qm@ m`rD 'w mwTnun `l~ t'shyr@ lqD `Tlth `l~ lshTy', 'w lky ttm lmwfq@ `l~ nDmm l`b kr@ l~ lfryq lwTny, yjb 'n tjtm` 'Slan kl 'nw` ltqryr wlshhdt lty tkhShm, (shhd@ lnTwr wzml l`ml wlshrT@ wkhly@ mwZWfwn m`dWwn lhdhh lmhm@. 'm m yql fy hdhh ltSryH fl `lq@ lh lbt@ bmwhb@ lmwTn fy lrsm 'w fy l`b lkr@, wl `lq@ lh bm dh knt tsmH lh Hlth lSHy@ bqD `Tl@ `l~ lshTy'. hnk 'mr wHd yhm whw m ysmW~ <> ('y mdh yqwl lmwTn, bmdh yfkr, kyf ytSrf, hl yshrk fy ljtm`t 'w fy ltZhrt fy l'wl mn yr). wbm 'n kl shy (lHy@ lywmy@ wltrqy@ wl`Tlt) mrtbT blTryq@ lty yqyWmwn fyh slwk lmwTn, fn ljmy` mDTrwn dhan, (mn 'jl ll`b m` lfryq lwTny 'w lltmkn mn qm@ m`rD, 'w lqD `Tl@ `l~ shTy' lbHr) lltSrf bTryq@ tj`l `lmthm Hsn@. friedrich-nietzche friedrich-nietzsche love milan-kundera neitzsche novel philosophy philosophy-of-life political psychological psychology religion religion-and-philoshophy sex sociology اجتماع جنس حب علم-نفس فلسفة فلسفة-حياة كائن-لا-تحتمل-خفته ميلان-كونديرا نيتشه ميلان كونديرا
dd781c8 Believe me, once you have tasted worship--the kind of worship that captures your heart and rivets your full attention on the living Lord--nothing less satisfies. Nothing else even comes close. Once you have tasted true worship, you will never want to play church again. life religion Charles R. Swindoll
31603c6 I allowed myself the supernatural, the transcendent, because, I told myself, our love of metaphor is pre-religious, born of our need to express what is inexpressible, our dreams of otherness, of more. religion Salman Rushdie
b644929 It is from the death of the social that socialism will emerge, as it is from the death of God that religions emerge. religion simulation social socialism Jean Baudrillard
13ec223 "We have a predator that came from the depths of the cosmos and took over the rule of our lives. Human beings are its prisoners. The Predator is our lord and master. It has rendered us docile, helpless. If we want to protest, it suppresses our protest. If we want to act independently, it demands that we don't do so... I have been beating around the bush all this time, insinuating to you that something is holding us prisoner. Indeed we are held prisoner! "This was an energetic fact for the sorcerers of ancient Mexico ... They took us over because we are food for them, and they squeeze us mercilessly because we are their sustenance. just as we rear chickens in chicken coops, the predators rear us in human coops, humaneros. Therefore, their food is always available to them." "No, no, no, no," [Carlos replies] "This is absurd don Juan. What you're saying is something monstrous. It simply can't be true, for sorcerers or for average men, or for anyone." "Why not?" don Juan asked calmly. "Why not? Because it infuriates you? ... You haven't heard all the claims yet. I want to appeal to your analytical mind. Think for a moment, and tell me how you would explain the contradictions between the intelligence of man the engineer and the stupidity of his systems of beliefs, or the stupidity of his contradictory behaviour. Sorcerers believe that the predators have given us our systems of belief, our ideas of good and evil, our social mores. They are the ones who set up our hopes and expectations and dreams of success or failure. They have given us covetousness, greed, and cowardice. It is the predators who make us complacent, routinary, and egomaniacal." "'But how can they do this, don Juan? [Carlos] asked, somehow angered further by what [don Juan] was saying. "'Do they whisper all that in our ears while we are asleep?" "'No, they don't do it that way. That's idiotic!" don Juan said, smiling. "They are infinitely more efficient and organized than that. In order to keep us obedient and meek and weak, the predators engaged themselves in a stupendous manoeuvre stupendous, of course, from the point of view of a fighting strategist. A horrendous manoeuvre from the point of view of those who suffer it. They gave us their mind! Do you hear me? The predators give us their mind, which becomes our mind. The predators' mind is baroque, contradictory, morose, filled with the fear of being discovered any minute now." "I know that even though you have never suffered hunger... you have food anxiety, which is none other than the anxiety of the predator who fears that any moment now its manoeuvre is going to be uncovered and food is going to be denied. Through the mind, which, after all, is their mind, the predators inject into the lives of human beings whatever is convenient for them. And they ensure, in this manner, a degree of security to act as a buffer against their fear." "The sorcerers of ancient Mexico were quite ill at ease with the idea of when [the predator] made its appearance on Earth. They reasoned that man must have been a complete being at one point, with stupendous insights, feats of awareness that are mythological legends nowadays. And then, everything seems to disappear, and we have now a sedated man. What I'm saying is that what we have against us is not a simple predator. It is very smart, and organized. It follows a methodical system to render us useless. Man, the magical being that he is destined to be, is no longer magical. He's an average piece of meat." "There are no more dreams for man but the dreams of an animal who is being raised to become a piece of meat: trite, conventional, imbecilic." aliens ancient-history anunnaki beliefs cause-and-effect chaos cognitive-dissonance cosmos dreams food human important magic manipulation matrix mind-control occult predator problems religion secrets service shamanism slavery sorcerer sorcery virus Carlos Castaneda
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