I hear and behold God in every object, yet understand God not in the least, Nor do I understand who there can be more wonderful than myself.

There was a time when skepticism was an act of rebellion. Since to a degree I both believe in evolution and have faith, I can only conclude that, as prophesied, to have faith will someday...

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.

In our worldly perceptions of Jesus, we tend to embrace the kindness of his love (‘be encouraged’) but not the discipline of his love (‘and sin no more’). But with the whole scope of his...

It is a strange fact, incidentally, that religious apologists love the anthropic principle. For some reason that makes no sense at all, they think it supports their case. Precisely the opposite is true. The anthropic...

The conscious attempt to be a good person without Christ is as legalistic as an attempt to make it into Heaven through empty religiosity.

Whenever people are certain they understand our peculiar situation here on this planet, it is because they have accepted a religious Faith or a secular Ideology (Ideologies are the modern form of Faiths) and just...

This is a lttle prayer dedicated to the separation of church and state. I guess if they are going to force those kids to pray in schools they might as well have a nice prayer...

I tell you, lad, that men will believe is one says, “The Gods say…” They will believe if one says, “I had a Vision…” They will believe if one says, “It was told me on...

Verily I say unto you all: Arise and shine forth, that thy light may be a standard for the nations.

Your right of religious freedom ends where my right of religious abstinence begins…

As became a young sinner, Sam [Mark Twain] had a special interest in Satan. He asked his Sunday school teacher questions about Eve in the garden, wondering “if he had ever heard of another woman...

He, too, was in the grip of rage and rhetoric. I saw that, attractive though his side of the political spectrum was. A cancerous violence had eaten into every political idea, had taken over the...

Your God person puts an apple tree in the middle of a garden and says, do what you like, guys, oh, but don’t eat the apple. Surprise surprise, they eat it and he leaps out...

Not bad, not bad at all,” Diotallevi said. “To arrive at the truth through the painstaking reconstruction of a false text.

Atheism leaves a man to sense, to philosophy, to natural piety, to laws, to reputation; all which may be guides to an outward moral virtue, though religion were not; but superstition dismounts all these, and...

We do not want to be beginners (at prayer), but let us be convinced of the fact that we will never be anything but beginners all of our lives. –Thomas Merton

Saying of the ProphetStruggleThe holy warrior is he who struggles with himself.

Those who would renegotiate the boundaries between church and state must therefore answer a difficult question: why would we trade a system that has served us so well for one that has served others so...

The only valid faith today is disbelief.

The wise men posit questions to which they may not always find immediate answers, but through their reflections God stimulates man in his search for truth – which in the last analysis is a search...

Dicho del ProfetaVerdadDecir la verdad a los injustos es la mejor de las guerras santas.

Love is the purest religion and the most destructive addiction!

Trata a este mundo como yo; como un caminante, un jinete que se detiene a la sombra de un árbol por un tiempo, y luego prosigue su camino.

How do you know it’s not true if you don’t believe in it?

I dwell mostly upon the religious aspects, because I believe it is the religious people who are to be relied upon in this Anti-Slavery movement. Do not misunderstand my railing—do not class me with those...

Religion thrives on want and fear of the unknown, on lack of education. A frightened and confused human is fed by religious institutions with the illusion that the solution to his real problems is to...

The more he saw, the more he doubted. He watched men narrowly, and saw how, beneath the surface, courage was often rashness; and prudence, cowardice; generosity, a clever piece of calculation; justice, a wrong; delicacy,...

I couldn’t get Him out of my head. Still can’t. I spent three solid days thinking about Him. The more He bothered me, the less I coul forget Him. And the more I learned about...

It strikes me often while I am in Iran that were Christian evangelicals to take a tour of Iran today, they might find it the model for an ideal society they seek in America. Replace...

I think it’s perfectly possible to explain how the universe came about without bringing God into it, but I don’t know everything, and there may well be a God somewhere, hiding away. Actually, if he...

There is going to come a time when we have to accept who we are without the assistance of religion. That will be the dawn of true faith. We leave the big decisions to invisible...

Oenone had found the chapel by accident, and was not certain what kept drawing her back to it. She was not a Christian. Few people were anymore, except in Africa, and on certain islands of...

The believer in magic and miracles reflects on how to impose a law on nature–: and, in brief, the religious cult is the outcome of this reflection.

The difference between politics and religion is that the first makes it legal to hate, and makes the love of the second illegal.

The worst tragedy of sin isn’t that it produced bad behavior, but that it produced the idea that bad behavior is strong enough to deflect love.

Earth is a homicide victim. We lose our children. There are wars. Disease. And God comes strolling by like a cosmic Billie Burke.

Catholic, Episcopalian, I won’t have sects with you.

God does not bring two people together for the benefit of just one

Let’s say I have a mystical soul and a rational brain, and, like Montaigne, I am incapable of choosing between them. I don’t know if I believe in God, but I am often tempted to...

Everyone takes part in the mosque for one reason; to have a prayer answered.

Hearing nuns’ confessions is like being stoned to death with popcorn.

There is enough mystery in human nature to keep the world stuck in a perpetual state of righteous speculation. Only the wise and compassionate will rise above it, with enough vision to see that inconsistency...

Fatima benim bir parçamdır, kim ki Fatima’ya kötülük eder, tıpkı bana (kötülük etmiş gibi) olur; kim ki onu hoşnut eder, beni hoşnut etmiş olur.

God didn’t design your life so you would constantly fall down, but he does hope that you will be brought to your knees.

Rumi and Shams bring to our lives the simple truth that we are not alone, that God really does care. And God’s joyous love for each of us is rivaled only by Her divine sense...

Your RELIGION does not make you a good person. Your BEHAVIOR does.

We fundamentalists are a pack of mood-loving showoffs. I’m sure the Minor Prophets would have found subject for correction.

Humanity’s relationship with the Divine is one of mutual give and take, and we mutually opted to part ways. But this perpetuation – setting up a way of thinking, and just letting it run –...

God’s gifts put men’s best dreams to shame.