quotations about religion
Theology, sir, is a fortress; no crack in a fortress may be accounted small.
ARTHUR MILLER
The Crucible
Does religion fill a much needed gap? It is often said that there is a God-shaped gap in the brain which needs to be filled: we have a psychological need for God -- imaginary friend, father, big brother, confessor, confidant -- and the need has to be satisfied whether God really exists or not. But could it be that God clutters up a gap that we'd be better off filling with something else? Science, perhaps? Art? Human friendship? Humanism? Love of this life in the real world, giving no credence to other lives beyond the grave?
RICHARD DAWKINS
The God Delusion
The only consistent purpose of human religion was as a cover for the most bestial excesses of mass homicide, torment, and atrocity.
MICK FARREN
Darklost
If the very nature of religion is change, and we don't progress individually or as a species, then we have been left behind. Change is inevitable. I'm not sure structured religion will allow this, hence why its necessary to leave, for everyone. Once this happens, then the only religion one needs is: Life.
GEORGE ELERICK
"How I Found God After Leaving Religion", Patheos, February 13, 2016
Religions have approved themselves; they have ministered to sundry vital needs which they found reigning. When they violated other needs too strongly, or when other faiths came which served the same needs better, the first religions were supplanted.
WILLIAM JAMES
Lectures XIV and XV, "The Value of Saintliness", The Varieties of Religious Experience
A religion that is small enough for us to understand would not be large enough for our needs.
GRENVILLE KLEISER
Dictionary of Proverbs
In reality there are as many religions as there are individuals.
MAHATMA GANDHI
Hind Swaraj
It has been said that men carry on a kind of coasting trade with religion. In the voyage of life, they profess to be in search of heaven, but take care not to venture so far in their approximations to it, as entirely to lose sight of the earth; and should their frail vessel be in danger of shipwreck, they will gladly throw their darling vices overboard, as other mariners their treasures, only to fish them up again when the storm is over.
CHARLES CALEB COLTON
Lacon
People kill and are killed because they cling too tightly to their own beliefs and ideologies. When we believe that ours is the only faith that contains the truth, violence and suffering will surely be the result.
THICH NHAT HANH
Living Buddha, Living Christ
Religion is only another word for the right use of a man's whole self, instead of a wrong use of himself.
HENRY WARD BEECHER
Proverbs from Plymouth Pulpit
The foulest sinner of all is the hypocrite who makes a racket of religion.
ROBERT A. HEINLEIN
Stranger in a Strange Land
A religion which requires persecution to sustain it is of the devil's propagation.
HOSEA BALLOU
Edge-Tools of Speech
I believe firmly in the efficacy of religion, in its powerful influence on a person's whole life. It helps immeasurably to meet the storms and stress of life and keep you attuned to the Divine inspiration. Without inspiration, we would perish.
WALT DISNEY
attributed, How to Be Like Walt
Some will tell you all you need is religion. They are wrong. You can go to church, mosque or synagogue ten times a day, pray hard and read the Scriptures as often as possible, give generous alms, and visit holy cites weekly. None of that can stop demons from rising in you, if you harbor jealousy or evil intentions toward your neighbour or fellow human.
PETER ABRAHAMS
Killers of the True Holy War
The challenge would be not to follow a religion unthinkingly, but to succeed in taking seriously a text that was written two thousand years ago -- in taking seriously every word and every story -- and nevertheless to live in the present in a humanitarian and enlightened way. Nobody says that this is easy, but human consciousness is capable of it. Religion is never just the Word of God. It is the ever-changing relationship of humans to this word. It is from just this movement of the human spirit that the great cultures have arisen.
NAVID KERMANI
"Of Course Religion is First and Foremost a Duty", First Things, January 20, 2016
Immorality, no less than morality, has at all times found support in religion.
SIGMUND FREUD
The Future of an Illusion
If everyone will try to understand the core of his own religion and adhere to it, and will not allow false teachers to dictate to him, there will be no room left for quarrelling.
MAHATMA GANDHI
Hind Swaraj
No religion is the new religion.
ANDREW BROWN
"No religion is the new religion", The Guardian, January 20, 2016
Is it not strange that mankind should so willingly battle for religion and so unwillingly live according to its precepts?
GEORG CHRISTOPH LICHTENBERG
The Reflections of Lichtenberg
If Men are so wicked as we now see them with Religion what would they be if without it?
BENJAMIN FRANKLIN
letter to unknown recipient, December 13, 1757