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fcc572a Some people would much prefer the infinite regress of mysteries, apparently, but in this day and age the cost is prohibitive: you have to get yourself deceived. You can either deceive yourself or let others do the dirty work, but there is no intellectually defensible way of rebuilding the mighty barriers to comprehension that Darwin smashed. (p.25) delusion infinite-regress religion Daniel C. Dennett
1e2c048 "I'm sorry," Leon said. "I can see you loved your two friends and you miss them, and maybe they're flying around somewhere in the sky, zipping here and there and being spirits and happy. But you and I and three billion other people are not, and until it changes here it won't be enough, Phil; not enough. Despite the supreme heavenly father. He has to do something for us here, and that's the truth. If you believe in the truth--well, Phil, that's the truth. The harsh, unpleasant truth." religion truth valis Philip K. Dick
f89ddc9 "I care not whether a man is Good or Evil; all that I care Is whether he is a Wise man or a Fool. Go! put off Holiness, fool good holiness intelligence philosophy religion stupidity wisdom William Blake
3a5b580 Nothing in the record of human history argues for divine morality, and a great deal argues against it. What we know is that good people very often suffer terribly, while the perpetrators of horrific evil backstroke through all the pleasures of the world. There is no evidence that the score is ever evened in this life or any after. evil god good good-and-evil history religion suffering Ta-Nehisi Coates
55fe8bb ?Has pensado alguna vez en la muerte? Si. A veces. ?Y tu? Si. A veces. ?Crees que existe un cielo? Si. ?Tu no? No lo se. Quiza si. ?Crees que puedes creer en el cielo si no crees en el infierno? Creo que puedes creer lo que quieras. muerte religion Cormac McCarthy
46bbd8c There's one thing worse than a failed old religion: a naive and arrogant new one. religion Brian D. McLaren
1c554b5 "... rather than God being "out there" in the heights, God is known in the depths of personal experience." philosophy religion spirituality Marcus J. Borg
0331a36 Don't let the devil hear you, minister, The devil has such good hearing he doesn't need things to be spoken out loud, Well, god help us then, There's no point asking him for help either, he was born stone-deaf. god humor religion José Saramago
92fb64a Holding the lamb in his arms, Jesus watched the people file past, some coming, some going, some carrying animals to be sacrificed, some returning without them, looking joyful and exclaiming, Alleluia, Hosanna, Amen, or saying none of these things, feeling it was inappropriate to walk around shouting Hallelujah or Hip hip hurrah, because there is really not much difference between the two expressions, we use them enthusiastically until with the passage of time and by dint of repetition we finally ask ourselves, What does it mean, only to find there is no answer. religion José Saramago
e205af1 There are worse things than eating the dead, my dear fellow. Far worse things. There is, for instance, making a huge profit out of their funeral, which is the normal custom in the civilized world. humorous-quotes religion satire Leonard Wibberley
3df5d42 "Resurrection" does not mean resumption of previous existence but entry into a different kind of existence." philosophy religion spirituality Marcus J. Borg
25d43ce It's a shameful, wicked, abominable law, and I'll break it, for one, the first time I get a chance; and I hope I shall have a chance, I do! Things have got to a pretty pass, if a woman can't give a warm supper and a bed to poor, starving creatures, just because they are slaves, and have been abused and oppressed all their lives, poor things! compassion empathy equality freedom humanity politics racism religion slavery Harriet Beecher Stowe
275ad81 In religion as in parenthood, uncritical loyalty to our ancestors may implicate us in an injustice against our descendants: imprisoning them in the errors of our ancestors. religion Brian D. McLaren
ff65604 Religion mattered at a deep level, which must help to explain why none of these people went over to Islam; but in most cases it did not direct their lives, nor did it prevent some of them from cultivating their connection with a powerful relative who was a Muslim convert. Whilst the fact that they were Catholics from one of Christendom's frontier zones may have given them an enhanced sense of their Catholicism, the fact that they were Albanians, connected by language, blood and history to Ottoman subjects and Ottoman territory, gave them an ability to see things also from something more like an Ottoman perspective albanian catholics christianity convert muslims ottoman religion Noel Malcolm
38e825e Christianity is supposed to be all about love but it's utterly useless when you're love. love religion Jane Gardam
d5dbd75 I guess God can be whatever God wants to be. Maybe God's so great that even our little rules about material reality and our tiny little universe don't mean anything to God. You ever think of that? religion Donna Leon
4c54112 "Mahatma Gandhi was as devout a Rambhakt as you can get -- he died from a Hindu assassin's bullet with the words "He Ram" on his lips -- but he always said that for him, Ram and Rahim were the same deity, and that if Hinduism ever taught hatred of Islam or of non-Hindus, "it is doomed to destruction." india islam religion Shashi Tharoor
3e45856 How do I pray? Not in any organized form, really; I go to temples sometimes with my family, but they leave me cold. I think of prayer as something intensely personal, a way of reaching my hands out towards my maker. I recite some mantras my parents taught me as a child; there is something reassuring about those ancient words, hallowed by use and repetition over thousands of years. prayer religion temples Shashi Tharoor
8ae633d "Hindu fundamentalism," because Hinduism is a religion without fundamentals: no organized church, no compulsory beliefs or rites of worship, no single sacred book. The name itself denotes something less, and more, than a set of theological beliefs. In many languages -- French and Persian amongst them -- the word for "Indian" is "Hindu." Originally "Hindu" simply meant the people beyond the river Sindhu, or Indus. But the Indus is now in Islamic Pakistan; and to make matters worse, the word "Hindu" did not exist in any Indian language till its use by foreigners gave Indians a term for self-definition." india religion Shashi Tharoor
41068b4 "Above all, as a Hindu I belong to the only major religion in the world that does not claim to be the only true religion. I find it immensely congenial to be able to face my fellow human beings of other faiths without being burdened by the conviction that I am embarked upon a "true path" that they have missed." india religion Shashi Tharoor
8fe8f3e "Goruyorsun ya, ailede herkes genellikle iyi. Oyleyse neden kucuk Isa bize yakinlik gostermiyor? Dr. Faulhaber'in evine gidersin masanin bir suru seyler tepeleme dolu oldugunu gorursun. Villas-Boaslarda da oyle. Dr. Adaucto Luz'dan hic soz etmeyelim." Ilk kez, Totoca'nin aglamak uzere oldugunu gordum. "Bu nedenle, kucuk Isanin yalniz is olsun diye yoksul dogmak istedigini dusunuyorum. Sonra da, yalnizca zenginlerin zahmete degdigini gormustu... Neyse, birakalim bunlari. Belki soylediklerim cok gunah." fairness poverty religion sad José Mauro de Vasconcelos
77a999b Saeed went with his father to pray on the first Friday after the curfew's commencement, and Saeed prayer for peace and Saeed's father prayed for Saeed and the preacher in his sermon urged all the congregants to pry for the righteous to emerge victorious in the war but carefully refrained from specifying on which side of the conflict he thought the righteous to be. prayer religion Mohsin Hamid
c812a16 It seems [...] that the Native American 'brain smasher' and the ancient Egyptian goddess in the vignette from the Fifth Hour of the Duat both serve exactly the same function, namely, the annihilation and permanent destruction of unworthy souls on the afterlife journey. There are differences in the traditions, to be sure, as one would expect if they descended from a remote common ancestor many millennia ago and then evolved separately, but the fundamental similarities of the role are unmissable. A further point arising from this material has to do with the more general issue of the trials and tribulations faced by the soul on its postmortem journey. That the precise character of these obstacles should vary between ancient Egypt and ancient Native America is only to be expected. Even so, the striking similarities in the core structure of the 'story'--physical death, a journey of the soul on land, a leap to the sky involving Orion followed by a further journey with perils and challenges to be faced, through the valley of the Milky Way--all argue for some as yet unexplained connection. journey orion religion souls source tradition Graham Hancock
b1322b1 "The relationship among faith, knowledge, and belief is suggested by a story involving the famous depth psychologist Carl Jung. In the last year of his life, he was interviewed for a BBC television documentary. The interviewer asked him, "Dr. Jung, do you believe in God?" Jung said, "Believe? I do not believe in God - I know." The point: the more one knows God, the less faith as belief is involved. But faith as belief still has a role: it can provide a basis for responding even when one does not know for sure, and it can also get one through periods of time in which firsthand experiences of God are lacking." philosophy religion spirituality Marcus J. Borg
6dd69b3 Religion lives not in dogma, but utterly within the virtues of love and self-sacrifice. Without those, there is no future I can bear to stand, nor hope for the continuance of God's creation. It is not blasphemy to say that the work of Jesus the redeemer was and is to break the chains of the realms of darkness. And set free the creature from the power of sin. religion salvation Warren Ellis
cd7deed Who knows whence this creation had its origin? He, whether He fashioned it or whether He did not, He, who surveys it all from the highest heaven, He knows--or maybe even He does not know. -- Rig Veda, X.129 1 'Maybe even He does not know!' I love a faith that raises such a fundamental question about no less a Supreme Being than the Creator of the Universe Himself. Maybe He does not know, indeed. Who are we mere mortals to claim a knowledge of which even He cannot be certain? india nationalism religion Shashi Tharoor
b3a36b1 One must die to an old way of being in order to enter a new way of being... salvation is resurrection to a new way of being here and now. philosophy religion spirituality Marcus J. Borg
35c6539 Be gentle and forbearing with one another and, if one has a difference(a grievance or complaint) against another, readily pardoning each other; even as the Lord has [freely] forgiven you, so must you also [forgive]. ( Colossians 3:13 ) god love religion self-help spirituality Joyce Meyer
2d2698e Comme ils sont dans l'erreur ceux qui voient en Elua un dieu bien delicat, fait uniquement pour etre adore par les amants aux yeux tournes vers les etoiles. Mais que les guerriers clament donc leur foi dans des dieux de sang et de tonnerre ; l'amour est dur, plus dur que l'acier - et trois fois plus cruel. Il est inexorable comme la maree, et la vie et la mort marchent sur ses brisees. love religion Jacqueline Carey
6a700c9 "In describing the ways that religious and other types of communities appropriate and understand their histories, among both fundamentalists and non-fundamentalists, the sociologist Anthony Giddens utilizes the term "reflexivity" and states that it is the characteristic of "all human action." Reflexivity takes place when individuals and/or communities utilize their perceptions of their histories as a way of guiding their present and future actions. For Giddens, tradition is a means of "handling time and space, which asserts any particular activity or experience with the community of past, present, and future, these in turn being structured by recurrent social practices." In light of this, tradition is a set of entities which religious communities and cultures continually reconstruct within certain parameters. Religions are not completely static in that almost every new generation reinvents the religious and cultural inheritance from the generations that preceded it." fundamentalism islam islamism religion sociology Jon Armajani
e5c539f A three-day-old baby is a saint?' Willibald flapped his hands. 'Miracles happen, lord,' he said, 'they really do. They say little Rumwold sang God's praises whenever he suckled.' 'I feel much the same when I get hild of a tit,' I said, 'so does that make me a saint? religion saints tits Bernard Cornwell
cf7bb98 BERNARDA.-- Las mujeres en la iglesia no deben mirar mas hombre que al oficiante, y a ese porque tiene faldas. Volver la cabeza es buscar el calor de la pana. MUJER 1.-- (En voz baja) !Vieja lagarta recocida! LA PONCIA.-- (Entre dientes) !Sarmentosa por calentura de varon! BERNARDA.-- (Dando un golpe de baston en el suelo) !Alabado sea Dios! TODAS.-- (Santiguandose) Sea por siempre bendito y alabado. españa honor honour la-casa-de-bernarda-alba mourning religion spain spanish-literature teatro theater theatre theatre-plays Federico García Lorca
0e384eb A little eccentricity is a help to a general. It helps with the newspapers. The women love it too. Southern women like their men religious and a little mad. That's why the fall in love with preachers. humor love religion southern-women Michael Shaara
d17b919 Human beings, to me, are rather like electrical appliances that need to be charged regularly, and prayer is a way of plugging into that charge. prayer religion Shashi Tharoor
f23a566 ..if you put people on a diet, they start thinking about food. Or if you make someone stop smoking, all they think about is cigarettes. It seems logical enough to me that if you tell a person he can't have sex, he's going to be obsessive about the subject. Then to give him the power to tell other people how to run their sex lives, well, that's just asking for trouble. In a way, it's like having a blind person teach Art History, isn't it? paola religion sex Donna Leon
111cf37 If you ask a conservative for a statement of his political convictions, he may well say that he has none, and that the greatest heresy of modernity is precisely to see politics as a matter of convictions as though one could recuperate, at the level of political purpose, the consoling certainty which once was granted by religious faith. In another sense, however, conservatism does rest in a system of belief, and is opposed as much to the theory as to the practice of socialist and liberal politics. conservatives convictions liberalism religion socialism Roger Scruton
835ebe7 Saeed went with his father to pray on the first Friday after the curfew's commencement, and Saeed prayed for peace and Saeed's father prayed for Saeed and the preacher in his sermon urged all the congregants to pry for the righteous to emerge victorious in the war but carefully refrained from specifying on which side of the conflict he thought the righteous to be. prayer religion Mohsin Hamid
2249a68 "It's not unreasonable [...] to suppose that some kind of cosmic "sky-ground" religion lay behind the alignments to the solstices and the equinoxes at Watson Brake and at the other early sites--a religion sufficiently robust to ensure the continuous successful transmission of a system of geometry, astronomy, and architecture over thousands of years. John Clark is in no doubt. 'The evidence,' he says, 'suggests very old and widely disseminated knowledge about how to build large sites. The building lore persisted remarkably intact for so long that I think we can, and must, assume that it was part of special knowledge tied to ritual practice.' Where did this special knowledge come from before it appeared at Watson Brake?" knowledge monument-building religion transmission Graham Hancock
039c153 I spose it's wrong to pray that someone dies... But I've thought about all the prayers. If that's what I was doing them years...Asking something, someone, anything, for a big black anvil to fall from the sky like in the cartoons. Kerang! On Wankbag's head. Because nothing else was gunna save [me]... death irony religion salvation Tim Winton
9bf72f8 "As the ninth-century legal scholar Malik ibn Anas, founder of the Maliki school of law, once quipped, "This religion is a science, so pay close attention to those from whom you learn it." islam religion science Reza Aslan
a564d42 All these schools of though gradually transformed into legal institutions, the diversity of ideas and freedom of opinion that characterized their early development gave way to rigid formalism, strict adherence to precedent, and an almost complete stultification of independent though religion Reza Aslan
a4845cd [...] there can be no a priori moral framework in a modern democracy [...] religion Reza Aslan
26d55e4 Like most people born into a religious tradition, my faith was as familiar to me as my skin, and just as disregardable. religion Reza Aslan
535b4e0 Dr. Murray made it clear to me before I left that a woman who enhoys the Act is as loose as a harlot. God gives pleasure in it only to husbands. Women are the source of evil and temptation, therefore women are to blame when men fall into fleshly error. It was Eve who seduced Adam, Eve who entered into league with the serpent, who was the Devil in disguise. So the only pleasure women are allowed is in their children. men-and-women religion sex Colleen McCullough
1c5e5f7 Compassion has been advocated by all the great faiths because it has been found to be the safest and surest means of attaining enlightenment. religion Karen Armstrong
16fc42b Faith, he had learned that night in front of the flickering television, was most glorious when it was most untouched by reason. religion Michael Thomas Ford
609817a Dios impuso a los hombres el deber de dominar a las mujeres que son, fundamentalmente, debiles y estupidas. religion si-hubiera-espinas V.C. Andrews
318f20a A Catholic gets it early. Incense, organ music, ashes on the forehead, wafer on the tongue. The best things shimmer with fear. religion Don DeLillo
59a24b3 Christ, would you look at that shite? Supes an' religion, the two worst things on the planet. religion superheroes worst Garth Ennis
e1646e5 Know that God loves you very, very much. And remind others that they are loved too. If they don't want to hear that God loves them, then tell them you love them. It will be just as important! Beliefs vary, but love always works! love religion spirituality Sean Patrick Brennan
730bcf0 What we need is a new God. Somebody who knows what the fuck he's doing. god higher-power religion Edward P. Jones
c0bd86c When Frey asked students to draw the creation, the other kids drew animals and Adam and Eve. Caroline covered her paper in black crayon, then held it up to reveal she had punched out holes for the stars and the moon. 'And then there was light', she said... religion Christopher Andersen
c92ac73 The medieval European, who shared the fundamental assumptions of his Muslim contemporary, would have agreed with him in ascribing religious movements to religious causes, and would have sought no further for an explanation. But when Europeans ceased to accord first place to religion in their thoughts, sentiments, interests, and loyalties, they also ceased to admit that other men, in other times and places, could have done so. To a rationalistic and materialistic generation, it was inconceivable that such great debates and mighty conflicts could have involved no more than 'merely' religious issues. And so historians, once they had passed the stage of amused contempt, devised a series of explanations, setting forth for what they described as the 'real' or 'ultimate' significance 'underlying' religious movements and differences. The clashes and squabbles of the early churches, the great Schism, the Reformation, all were reinterpreted in terms of motives and interests reasonable by the standards of the day--and for religious movements of Islam too explanations were found that tallied with the outlook and interests of the finders. islam religion theology Bernard Lewis
b8e6c9f But my mother wanted her children to be educated by nuns and priests all dressed in black, the way it had been done down through the generations with her people. Taught by people who had a firm grasp of how big and awful the world could be. life nuns parochial-schools priests religion religious-education schools Edward P. Jones
2d73660 I wish that I could thoroughly believe in some creed. I wish that I was ignorant enough to know one truth and discard all others. religion Kate Horsley
f3b6e97 But while I fill up my mouth with prayers, they bring no comfort. My words rattle against each other like the last beech leaves on a winter branch, and though a hard wind scours the forest, it cannot free them from the bough; it will not lift them upward into the wide white sky. praying religion sadness Geraldine Brooks
9526c63 Never take away anything if you have nothing better to offer. Beware of stripping a patient who can't bear the chill of reality. And don't exhaust yourself by jousting with religious magic: you're no match for it. The thirst for religion is too strong, its roots too deep, its cultural reinforcement too powerful. reality religion Irvin D. Yalom
218477c The priest Zadok looked stricken. He had hoped to bargain information for a higher price. Now I, as a prophet, had given it to David for free. manipulation religion word-of-god Geraldine Brooks
35567fa Nunca discutas sobre Dios. Lo mejor es decir 'Estoy de acuerdo contigo'. Entonces vas a tu casa y rezas lo que tu quieres. Esta es mi idea para que las personas esten en paz con la religion. humor religion Elizabeth Gilbert
6faf505 I raised my hand and asked if God was a spirit. And he said yes, He was. So I asked if it was right that a spirit was different from a person because it didn't have a body, wasn't material. And when he agreed, I asked how, if God was a spirit, He could be a man, if He didn't have a body or anything. chiara god religion Donna Leon
4156f2a "Salome interrupts. We're not members! she repeats. We are the women of Molotschna. The entire colony of Molotschna is built on the foundation of patriarchy (translator's note: Salome didn't use the word "patriarchy" - I inserted it in the place of Salome's curse, of mysterious origin, loosely translated as "talking through the flowers"), where the women live our their days as mute, submissive, and obedient servants. Animals. Fourteen-year-old boys are expected to give us orders, to determine our fates, to vote on our excommunications, to speak at the burials of our own babies while we remain silent, to interpret the Bible for us, to lead us in worship, to punish us! We are not members, Mariche. We are commodities." religion women Miriam Toews
dbe3f8c Perhaps all of us are crazy, Ona says. Of course we're all crazy, says Mejal. How can we not be? feminism religion Miriam Toews
e7388df I find it curious that she hasn't been excommunicated. Are her small acts of rebellion a convenient outlet for Peters, a type of performance that satisfies the colonists' need to assert themselves, and that allows Peters to act with impunity on a larger scale? religion Miriam Toews
8501456 When does belief become justification? When does right become rationale and crusade become crime? exploit naive religion Libba Bray
fd1e96a Although churches seem the most natural space to perform spiritual awakening, the disconcerting reality is that many people in Western society see churches more as museums of religion than sacred stages that dramatize the movement of God's spirit. religion spirituality Diana Butler Bass
988eb60 "Remember!" she called, as she followed him up the narrow ladders towards the bridge. "It is only a matter of scale and experience. You are not a fraction of the whole. You are a version of the whole! Time will seem to eddy and stall. This is scale. Everything is sentient, but scale alters perception. The time of a tree is not your time." It was as if she shouted to him all she had meant to teach him before this moment. "To the snail the foot which comes from nowhere and crushes him is as natural a disaster as a hurricane; it cannot be appealed to and is impossible to anticipate. The time of a star is not our time. Equity is the natural condition of the multiverse. There are things to fear in the colour fields, but not the fields themselves! Remember, Sam, we are God in miniature!" faith god life philosophy religion Michael Moorcock
d202a44 esas comparaciones de prometido, esposo, amante celestial y de matrimonio eterno, que se repiten en los sermones, le despertaban en lo hondo del corazon ternezas inesperadas religion Flaubert Gustave
e57a58e Dear God, I don't want my fear to be a barrier to the blessings you are trying to bestow. Cast out my fear, and help me to trust your perfect love. But also grant me a full measure of wisdom. Do not let me be led astray by my own desires. If it is not your will that I pursue a relationship with Levi, I pray that you will stop me. Make your message so clear that I cannot argue it away. Protect me, Lord, and show me the way I should go. faith-quotes godly-woman historical inspirational prayer relationships religion wisdom Karen Witemeyer
49f8fda "Many say that it is ethnocentric to claim that our religion is superior to others. Yet isn't that very statement ethnocentric? Most non-Western cultures have no problem saying that their culture and religion is best. The idea that it is wrong to do so is deeply rooted in Western traditions of self-criticism and individualism. To charge others with the "sin" of ethnocentrism is really a way of saying, "Our culture's approach to other cultures is superior to yours." culture relativism religion Timothy J. Keller
7cabb24 GOD HAS TAKEN YOUR MOTHER. MY HANDS WERE THE INSTRUMENT. GOD HAS TAKEN MY HANDS. I AM GOD'S INSTRUMENT. fate religion John Irving
01d0f67 [...]every study of the gods, of everyone's gods, is a revelation of vengeance toward the innocent religion John Irving
28d712b "El papa Benedicto XVI habia dicho que la pederastia se consideraba normal hasta fecha tan reciente como los anos setenta. [...] - Benedicto dijo: "Nada es bueno o malo en si mismo". Dijo "nada", Clark -repitio Juan Diego a su exalumno-. La pederastia no es "nada"; seguramente la pederastia si es "mala en si misma", Clark." papa pederastia pederasty pope-benedict-xvi religion John Irving
f3d5edd "We all live as if it is better to seek peace instead of war, to tell the truth instead of lying, to care and nurture rather than to destroy. We believe that these choices are not pointless, that it matters which way we choose to live. Yet if the Cosmic Bench is truly empty, then "who sez" that one choice is better than the others? We can argue about it, but it's just pointless arguing, endless litigation. If the Bench is truly empty, then the whole span of human civilization, even if it lasts a few million years, will be just an infinitesimally brief spark in relation to the oceans of dead time that preceded it and will follow it. There will be no one around to remember any of it. Whether we are loving or cruel in the end would make no difference at all. Once we realize this situation there are two options. One is that we can simply refuse to think out the implications of all this. We can hold on to our intellectual belief in an empty Bench and yet live as if our choices are meaningful and as if there is a difference between love and cruelty. Why would we do that? A cynic might say that this is a way of "having one's cake and eating it, too." That is, you can get the benefit of having a God without the cost of following him. But there is no integrity in that. The other option is to recognize that you do know there is a God. You could accept the fact that you live as if beauty and love have meaning, as if there is meaning in life, as if human beings have inherent dignity--all because you know God exists. It is dishonest to live as if he is there and yet fail to acknowledge the one who has given you all these gifts." philosophy religion Timothy J. Keller
8cb309a I once read a short story about some cannibals who didn't turn their victims into steaks and chops and roasts; they made them all into sausages. Because when you're eating a sausage you don't think so much about what you're eating. It's the same with communion wafers. .......... My point is, the miracle of the Holy Communion is when the priest turns these little white disks into the flesh of Jesus Christ. They call it transubstantiation. So, if you buy that, then the host the priest places on your tongue is actually a silver of Jesus meat. But they make the host as different from meat as they can, so even though communion is a form of cannibalism, nobody gets grossed out. Like with the sausages. god humor religion transubstantiation Pete Hautman
e87c3f3 A meaningless life for a human being has none of the dignity of animal unselfconsciousness; we cannot simply eat, sleep, hunt and reproduce - we are meaning-seeking creatures. The Western world has done away with religion but not with religious impulses; we seem to need some higher purpose, some point to our lives - money and leisure, social progress, are just not enough. religion Jeanette Winterson
d3521a9 As a species we are a predominantly intelligent and exploratory animal, and beliefs harnessed to this fact will be the most beneficial for us. A belief in the validity of the acquisition of knowledge and a scientific understanding of the world we live in, the creation and appreciation of aesthetic phenomena in all their many forms, and the broadening and deepening of our range of experiences in day-to-day living, is rapidly becoming the 'religion' of our time. Experience and understanding are our rather abstract god-figures, and ignorance and stupidity will make them angry. Our schools and universities are our religious training centres, our libraries, museums, art galleries, theatres, concert halls and sports arenas are our places of communal worship. At home we worship with our books. newspapers. magazines, radios and television sets. In a sense, we still believe in an after-life, because part of the reward obtained from our creative works is the feeling that, through them, we will 'live on' after we are dead. Like all religions, this one has its dangers, but if we have to have one, and it seems that we do, then it certainly appears to be the one most suitable for the unique biological qualities of our species. Its adoption by an ever-growing majority of the world population can serve as a compensating and reassuring source of optimism to set against the pessimism (...) concerning our immediate future as a surviving species. belief immortality literature religion science Desmond Morris
99577bb I cannot pray. I talk to God through my sculpture and painting.' 'That's also prayer.' He smiled faintly, the morning sun on his face. 'The Rebbe said precisely that. You are following the party line, Asher Lev. But we know it is not the same thing, don't we? religion Chaim Potok
562c833 Become a great artist. That is the only way to justify what you are doing to everyone's life.'... I did not understand what he meant. I did not feel I had to justify anything... I did not want to paint in order to justify anything, I wanted to paint because I wanted to paint. I wanted to paint the same way my father wanted to travel and work for the Rebbe. My father worked for Torah. I worked for - what? How could I explain it? For beauty? No. Many of the pictures I painted were not beautiful. For what, then? For a truth I did not know how to put into words. For truth I could only bring to life by means of color and line and texture and form. judaism religion social-pressure truth Chaim Potok
e1fd7ce In the lives of saints I look for confirmation of excess. To them it is not strange to spend nights on a mountain or to forgo food. For them, the visionary and the everyday coincide. Above all, they have no domestic virtues, preferring intensity to comfort. Despite their inhospitable ways, they ferment with unexpected life, like those bleak railway cuttings that host horizontal dandelions. They know there is no passion without pain. intensity pain passion religion saints visionaries Jeanette Winterson
f33f573 I'm always running into the Sunday God of churchgoing Christians and cannot help noticing that he doesn't help out much on weekdays. letters religion soul-of-the-age Hermann Hesse
7265df9 If it were proven that there is no God there would be no religion... But also if it were proven that there is a God, there would be no religion. religion Ursula K. Le Guin
bd86301 But I'm not such a good judge of monsters; I don't know if the idea of a good death repels me now because it's in itself repellent, or because I no longer have the courage to seek such a thing. martyrdom religion roman-catholicism Tim Winton
3e81aa2 Don't you see it Jaxie Clackton, you are an instrument of God.' 'Oh, I said, you mad fucker. You been out under the moon too long. premonition religion Tim Winton
d741b34 His point, again and again, was that truth wasn't the property of any one faith and that, if you looked closely, you found a ground where they all converged. religion truth Jeffrey Eugenides
1ae189f People need God the way a three-year-old needs a chainsaw. religion Ursula K. Le Guin
6460601 Creo que las distintas religiones son puertas diferentes para una misma casa. A veces creo que la casa existe, y otras veces que no. Ese es el gran misterio. pensamiento religion Walter Isaacson
499aff9 Then I brought up the obvious, that the physical vulnerabilities of a woman can be traced to that most important function of human accomplishments, the absorption of her strength in carrying, nursing and rearing children. I have always known that this one fact doomed females to a subordinate status in all societies. Instead of attaining honour for being producers of life, we are penalized! To my mind, this fact is the scandal of civilization! islamic muslim-women muslim-world religion society Jean Sasson
ef08431 "Cease, daughter!" said the priest at last in a trembling voice. "I cannot grant absolution, no priest could..." historical-fiction religion Anya Seton
214e605 Solange Gott ein Mann ist, nicht ein Paar, kann das Leben einer Frau, nur so bleiben wie es heute ist, namlich erbarmlich, die Frau als Proletarier der Schopfung, wenn auch noch so elegant verkleidet. frau gleichberechtigung gott religion Max Frisch
0a28c2e The Pope is often an embarrassment. Each Pope nurses his own foibles and follies, pet truths and pet hates, and all must be accommodated within the seamless seemingly unchanging whole of Catholic Truth. Often the Popes contradict one another, and even more often, they contradict the great masters they reanimate to support their own certainties. The theologians take it as a joke. They are interested in the power of the Church and her authority. Power, authority and revenues, are what they are there to protect. They can dye black white. They do. hypocrisy pope power religion Jeanette Winterson
ade43df One contradiction of the human heart is this: God refuses to see any one person as unique in his or her relationship to Him, and yet we humans see each other as bottomless wells of creativity and uniqueness. god-s-love philosophy philosophy-of-life philosophy-of-religion religion Douglas Coupland
ea639a3 Her favourite song was 'God Has Blotted Them Out,' which was meant to be about sins, but really was about anyone who had ever annoyed her, which was everyone. She just didn't like anyone and she just didn't like life. Life was a burden to be carried as far as the grave and then dumped. Life was a Vale of Tears. Life was a pre-death experience. death god life misanthropy religion revenge vengeance Jeanette Winterson
f3051b1 Mike wasn't religious, but it was pretty cool to imagine a superghost carrying you when shit got a little too real. religion Aric Davis
c333b9b Proof of the beginning of time probably ranks as the most theologically significant theorem. This great significance arises from the theorem establishing that the universe must be caused by some Entity capable of creating the universe entirely independent of space and time. Such an entity matches the attributes of the God of the Bible but is contradicted by the gods of the eastern (and indeed all other) religions who create within space and time. astrophysics big-bang god religion science Hugh Ross
80cf76c "Thou shalt have one God only; who Would be at the expense of two? No graven images may be Worshipped, except the currency: Swear not at all; for, for thy curse Thine enemy is none the worse: At church on Sunday to attend Will serve to keep the world thy friend: Honour thy parents; that is all From whom advancement may befall: Thou shalt not kill; but need'st not strive Officiously to keep alive: Do not adultery commit; Advantage rarely comes of it: Thou shalt not steal; an empty feat, When it's so lucrative to cheat: Bear not false witness; let the lie Have time on its own wings to fly: religion satire sin ten-commandments Arthur Hugh Clough
0a6d920 All at once I felt myself haunted by a terrible vision, of a world without guidance: a land of emptiness, where all was ruled by the madness of chance. How could one endure such a place, where all significance was lost? I myself would mean nothing, but would merely be a kind of self-invention: a speck upon the wind, calling itself Wilson. I felt my spirit waver, as if it were toppling into the abyss before me. humor religion Matthew Kneale
e550db3 We don't need the gospels, we need the fiery men who wrote them! christianity religion religious-hypocrisy the-gospels Rudolfo Anaya
0bc579f A common response in surveys of religious attitudes is to say something like, 'I don't go to church, but I have my own personal idea of God.' This kind of statement makes me in turn react like a philosopher. Soppy, I cry. You have your own personal idea of God, but does God have His own personal idea of you? Because that's what matters. Whether He's an old man with a white beard sitting in the sky, or a life force, or a disinterested prime mover, or a clockmaker, or a woman, or a nebulous moral force, or nothing at all, what counts is what He, She, It, or Nothing thinks of you rather than you of them. god religion Julian Barnes
aa34709 When facts are treated as if they were opinions, when there is no universal standard by which to determine truth in law, in science, in scholarship, or in the reporting of events of the day, the world becomes a place where lies become true, where people can believe what they want to believe, where there is no possibility of reaching any conclusion not predetermined by those who interpret the official, divinely inspired text. dominionism fanaticism religion science truth Chris Hedges
48aa1d6 "The refusal to examine Islamic culture and traditions, the sordid dehumanization of Muslims, and the utter disregard for the intellectual traditions and culture of one of the world's great civilizations are characteristic of those who disdain self-reflection and intellectual inquiry. Confronting this complexity requires work and study rather than a retreat into slogans and cliches. And enlightened, tolerant civilizations have flourished outside the orbit of the United Sates and Europe. The ruins of the ancient Mughal capital, Fatehpur Sikri, lie about 100 miles south of Delhi. The capital was constructed by the emperor Akbar the Great at the end of the sixteenth century. The emperor's court was filled with philosophers, mystics and religious scholars, including Sunni, Sufi, and Shiite Muslims, Hindu followers of Shiva and Vishnu, as well as atheists, Christians, Jains, Jews , Buddhists and Zoroastrians. They debated ethics and beliefs. He forbade any person to be discriminated against on the basis of belief and declared that everyone was free to follow any religion. This took place as the Inquisition was at its height in Spain and Portugal, and as Giordano Bruno was being burnt at the stake in Rome's Campo de Fiori. culture islam religion Chris Hedges
dd1505c "I remember my father telling me about England's redrawing of India's boundaries when it became independent. They wanted to separate the Hindu from the Muslim, but they used outdated maps. Twelve million people had to relocate because the Brits screwed it up so badly. And a half million people died during the resulting chaos. And before that, Iraq was unilaterally cobbled together, causing many of the conflicts we see today. There are dozens of such examples. The strong countries smashing the weaker ones and then avoiding responsibility later for the very problems they caused." "You keep proving my point, Tom, that we're rotten to the core." "My point is we never learn!" religion war David Baldacci
d540c9c That summer, in any case, all the fears with which I had grown up, and which were now a part of me and controlled my vision of the world, rose up like a wall between the world and me, and drove me into the church. race-and-racism-in-america religion James Baldwin
dae18d9 It's not like the Middle Ages, when you had the Church and the aristocracy keeping everything nice and stagnant. progress religion Kevin Hearne
cd89da4 "Perhaps no one religion contains all the truth of the world. Perhaps every religion contains fragments of the truth and it is our responsibility to identify those fragments and piece them together. Or perhaps the elves are right and there are no gods. But how can I know for sure?" - Pg 479 Brisingr" religion Christopher Paolini
ad75303 My life of conversation leads me to reimagine the very meaning of hope. I define hope as distinct from optimism or idealism. It has nothing to do with wishing. It references reality at every turn and reveres truth. It lives open eyed and wholeheartedly with the darkness that is woven ineluctably into the light of life and sometimes seems to overcome it. Hope, like every virtue, is a choice that becomes a habit that becomes spiritual muscle memory. enoughness faith habit hope on-being religion spirit spiritual truth virtue wholeheartedness Krista Tippett
922cff1 The mystery and art of living are as grand as the sweep of a lifetime and the lifetime of a species. And they are as close as beginning, quietly, to mine whatever grace and beauty, whatever healing and attentiveness, are possible in this moment and the next and the next one after that. attention awe beauty diversity enlightenment god grace humanity life life-force love mindfulness mystery on-being religion spirit wisdom wonder Krista Tippett
f74874d Buddhism spreads by people converting out of their own wish for peace and right action. But power condenses around those willing to use force. peace power religion war Kim Stanley Robinson
4c1cf5d Religion was all about getting dumbasses to line up and sign up, making people pay today for heaven tomorrow. religion Robert Ferrigno
a78cd24 When you look at the planet from low orbit, the impact of the Himalayas on Earth's climate seems obvious. It creates the rain shadow to beat all rain shadows, standing athwart the latitude of the trade winds and squeezing all the rain out of them before they head southwest, thus supplying eight of the Earth's mightiest rivers, but also parching not only the Gobi to the immediate north, but also everything to the southwest, including Pakistan and Iran, Mesopotamia, Saudi Arabia, even North Africa and southern Europe. The dry belt runs more than halfway across the Eurasia-African landmass -- a burnt rock landscape, home to the fiery religions that then spread out and torched the rest of the world. Coincidence? religion Kim Stanley Robinson
0796340 She'd never been religious. She hadn't allowed grief to send her crawling to the church. religion Michael Cunningham
a05db45 Der wesentliche Punkt ist hier, dass Menschen mit szientistischem Gedankengut wie Atkins oder Dawkins nicht unterscheiden zwischen Mechanismus und Urheberschaft. creation creationism dawkins religion science scientism John C. Lennox
a256821 "Religion was at it's best when it emphasized spiritual experiences rather than received dogma. "The juice goes out of Christianity when it becomes too based on faith, rather than living like Jesus or seeing the world as Jesus saw it," he told me. "I think different religions are different doors to the same house. Sometimes I think the house exists, and sometimes I don't. It's a great mystery." faith religion Walter Isaacson
022bc4c Their reliance on biblical quotations does not augur well for their for their openness to moral reasoning.... moral-philosophy religion Peter Singer
7875585 Agama bukan sekadar ritual dan tata cara. Ada makna di balik ritual dan tata cara itu. religion Yann Martel
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