Religion

"It was religion which, by teaching men their near relation to God, awakened in them the consciousness of their importance as individuals. It was the struggle for religious rights which opened men's eyes to all their rights. It was resistance to religious usurpation which led men to withstand political oppression. It was religious discussion which roused the minds of all classes to free and vigorous thought."

"Religion assures us that our afflictions shall have an end; she comforts us, she dries our tears, she promises us another life. On the contrary, in the abominable worship of atheism, human woes are the incense, death is the priest, a coffin the altar, and annihilation the Deity."

"I realized that ritual will always mean throwing away something; Destroying our corn or wine upon the altar of our gods."

"It is the test of a good religion whether you can joke about it."

"The rigid saint, by whom no mercy's shown To saints whose lives are better than his own, Shall spare thy crimes; and Wit, who never once Forgave a brother, shall forgive a dunce."

"Deos placatos pictas efficiet et sanctitas."

"Res sacros non modo manibus attingi, sed ne cogitatione quidem violari fas fuit."

"Religion is the most malevolent of all mind viruses."

"I for one would never be a party, unless the law were clear, to saying to any man who put forward his views on those most sacred things, that he should be branded as apparently criminal because he differed from the majority of mankind in his religious views or convictions on the subject of religion. If that were so, we should get into ages and times which, thank God, we do not live in, when people were put to death for opinions and beliefs which now almost all of us believe to be true."

"Forth from his dark and lonely hiding place, (Portentous sight!) the owlet atheism, Sailing on obscene wings athwart the noon, Drops his blue-fring'd lids, and holds them close, And hooting at the glorious sun in Heaven, Cries out, "Where is it?""

"Too soon did the Doctors of the Church forget that the Heart, the Moral Nature, was the Beginning and the End; and that Truth, Knowledge, and insight were comprehended in its expansion."

"Like all great theologies, Bill [O'Reilly]'s can be boiled down to one sentence: There must be a god, because I don't know how things work."

"Life and the Universe show spontaneity; Down with ridiculous notions of Deity! Churches and creeds are lost in the mists; Truth must be sought with the Positivists."

"Men will wrangle for religion; write for it; fight for it; die for it; anything but — live for it."

"The best thing about religion is that it's so transparently absurd it can't possibly last forever. I'm convinced it will only take a small shift in human consciousness for it to be laughed off the planet, and I hope I'm still around when that happens."

"Already some who never questioned have begun to wonder if all religion isn’t just a shell game perpetrated by societies of con men who milk the gullible."

"I took nothing at face. Everywhere I turned religion popped up, and that’s a game of masks and deceit and illusions if ever there was one."

"Do you comprehend the idea of symbol? You say you accept sorcery. The very root of sorcery is manipulation of symbol in a way that affects referent. And that’s the root of religion, too."

"For the majority of English people there are only two religions, Roman Catholic, which is wrong, and the rest, which don't matter."

"In America the taint of sectarianism lies broad upon the land. Not content with acknowledging the supremacy as the Deity, and with erecting temples in his honor, where all can bow down with reverence, the pride and vanity of human reason enter into and pollute our worship, and the houses that should be of God and for God, alone, where he is to be honored with submissive faith, are too often merely schools of metaphysical and useless distinctions. The nation is sectarian, rather than Christian."

"Religion, if in heavenly truths attired, Needs only to be seen to be admired."

"Religion does not censure or exclude Unnumbered pleasures, harmlessly pursued."

"Pity! Religion has so seldom found A skilful guide into poetic ground! The flowers would spring where'er she deign'd to stray And every muse attend her in her way."

"Sacred religion! Mother of Form and Fear!"

"Do you, good people, believe that Adam and Eve were created in the Garden of Eden and that they were forbidden to eat from the tree of knowledge? I do. The church has always been afraid of that tree. It still is afraid of knowledge. Some of you say religion makes people happy. So does laughing gas. So does whiskey. I believe in the brain of man. I'm not worried about my soul."

"Usbek can be as brilliant and satirical on occasion as his younger companion, but his aim is to probe to the heart of things, and he knows that truth will only reveal itself to a reverent search. To him all religions are worthy of respect, and their ministers also, for “God has chosen for Himself, in every corner of the earth, souls purer than the rest, whom He has separated from the impious world that their mortification and their fervent prayers may suspend His wrath.” He thinks that the surest way to please God is to obey the laws of society, and to do our duty towards men. Every religion assumes that God loves men, since He establishes a religion for their happiness; and since He loves men we are certain of pleasing Him in loving them, too. Usbek’s prayer in Letter XLVI. Is not yet out of date. “Lord, I do not understand any of those discussions that are carried on without end regarding Thee: I would serve Thee according to Thy will; but each man whom I consult would have me serve Thee according to his.” He insists that religion is intended for man’s happiness; and that, in order to love it and fulfil its behests, it is not necessary to hate and persecute those who are opposed to our beliefs – not necessary even to attempt to convert them. Indeed, he holds that variety of belief is beneficial to the state. A new sect is always the surest means of correcting the abuses of an old faith; and those who profess tolerated creeds usually prove more useful to their country than those who profess the established religion, because, being excluded from all honours, their endeavour to distinguish themselves by becoming wealthy improves trade and commerce."

"Many of us saw religion as harmless nonsense. Beliefs might lack all supporting evidence but, we thought, if people needed a crutch for consolation, where's the harm? September 11th changed all that. Revealed faith is not harmless nonsense, it can be lethally dangerous nonsense. Dangerous because it gives people unshakeable confidence in their own righteousness. Dangerous because it gives them false courage to kill themselves, which automatically removes normal barriers to killing others. Dangerous because it teaches enmity to others labelled only by a difference of inherited tradition. And dangerous because we have all bought into a weird respect, which uniquely protects religion from normal criticism. Let's now stop being so damned respectful!"

"I think that what really matters about a religion is whether it's true."

"If all enlightened men were, like us, to point out, in an impartial spirit, various defects found in different religions, it is not at all impossible that all quarrels should cease, that people should live together in peace all following one religion, and that truth should thus triumph."

"I was frightened even by God. I could not believe in his love, only his punishment. Faith. That, I felt, was the act of facing the tribunal of justice with one's head bowed to receive the scourge of God. I could believe in hell, but it was impossible for me to believe in the existence of heaven."

"Evolution’s logical, unlike religion. Even the Church will agree with that. You have to take religion on faith and you can’t test it by common sense."

"In the latter case it is often government that organizes the conquest, and religion that justifies it."

"Once he saw the officials of a temple leading away some one who had stolen a bowl belonging to the treasurers, and said, "The great thieves are leading away the little thief.""

"As for that," said Waldenshare, "sensible men are all of the same religion." "Pray what is that?" inquired the Prince. "Sensible men never tell."

"Religion, in its most general view, is such a Sense of God in the soul, and such a conviction of our obligations to Him, and of our dependence upon Him, as shall engage us to make it our great care to conduct ourselves in a manner which we have reason to believe will be pleasing to Him."

"Our love, when it is without counting the cost, leads the other toward God. Our love makes straight the paths of the Lord."

"Religious experiences which are as real as life to some may be incomprehensible to others."

"You can and you can't — You shall and you shan't — You will and you won't — And you will be damned if you do — And you will be damned if you don't."

"The sheet anchor of happiness is religion."

"Gardez-vous bien de lui les jours qu'il communie."

"L'institut des Jesuites est une épée dont la poigée est à Rome et la pointe partout."

"Puritanism and paganism — the repression and the expression of the senses and desires — alternate in mutual reaction in history. Generally religion and puritanism prevail in periods when the laws are feeble and morals must bear the burden of maintaining social order; skepticism and paganism (other factors being equal) progress as the rising power of law and governments permits the decline of the church, the family, and morality without basically endangering the stability of the state."

"There is no significant example in history, before our time, of a society successfully maintaining moral life without the aid of religion. France, the United States, and some other nations have divorced their governments from all churches, but they have had the help of religion in keeping social order."

"We frolic in our emancipation from theology, but have we developed a natural ethic — a moral code independent of religion — strong enough to keep our instincts of acquisition, pugnacity, and sex from debasing our civilization into a mire of greed, crime, and promiscuity? Have we really outgrown intolerance, or merely transferred it from religious to national, ideological, or racial hostilities?"

"Science and religion are two human enterprises sharing many common features. They share these features also with other enterprises such as art, literature and music. The most salient features of all these enterprises are discipline and diversity. Discipline to submerge the individual fantasy in a greater whole. Diversity to give scope to the infinite variety of human souls and temperaments. Without discipline there can be no greatness. Without diversity there can be no freedom. Greatness for the enterprise, freedom for the individual—these are the two themes, contrasting but not incompatible, that make up the history of science and the history of religion."

"Religion to me is really not about belief — it's about belonging. It's about a way of life."

"The whole religious complexion of the modern world is due to the absence, from Jerusalem, of a lunatic asylum."

"We do not want a religion that deceives us for our own good."

"If our so-called facts are changing shadows, they are shadows cast by the light of constant truth. So too in religion we are repelled by that confident theological doctrine... but we need not turn aside from the measure of light that comes into our experience showing us a Way through the unseen world."

"Science embraces facts and debates opinion; religion embraces opinion and debates the facts."