Religious Quotes

"Of course the case of the Christian Church planted among the nations must differ, in various ways, from that of any sect forming in connection with religious awakening in a territory of professing Christianity"

Robert Rainy, Clergyman

"For as Jews, the problem happens to be more urgent and vital than for others; because the destruction of religion on America will involve the destruction also of the religious training of freedom; and with that our civil liberties"

Louis Finkelstein, Clergyman

"North Eurasia is one of the best examples of religious tolerance and peaceful coexistence of Islam and Christianity. This is a rare thing in today's world, even in its most liberal parts"

Nursultan Nazarbayev, Politician

"A necessary consequent of religious belief is the attaching ideas of merit to that belief, and of demerit to its absence"

Francis Wright, Activist

"Today's Islamic fundamentalism is also a cover for political motifs. We should not overlook the political motifs we encounter in forms of religious fanaticism"

Jurgen Habermas, Philosopher

"Americans should be free to recognize our religious heritage; doing that is not the same as creating a government-sponsored religion"

Ernest Istook, Politician

"Also, I am very religious. It gave me peace of mind all my career"

Emerson Fittipaldi, Celebrity

"And the whole world, the whole world that believes in freedom, whether you're talking about personal freedom, economic freedom, religious freedom, they look to the United States for leadership; and you're part of that leadership"

Don Nickles, Politician

"Religious poetry, civic poetry, lyric or dramatic poetry are all categories of man's expression which are valid only if the endorsement of formal content is valid"

Salvatore Quasimodo, Author

"Every religious group, while perhaps a majority somewhere, is also inevitably a minority somewhere else. Thus, religious organizations should and do show tolerance toward members of other religious denominations"

Russell M. Nelson, Clergyman

"I choose to worship not believing in God and government should not thrust a religious idea down my throat"

Michael Newdow, Lawyer

"As a politician who cherishes religious conviction in his personal sphere, but regards politics as a domain belonging outside religion, I believe that this view is seriously flawed"

Recep Tayyip Erdogan, President

"I don't describe myself as a Christian or religious, but I like to think that how I live my life is honest"

Iris DeMent, Musician

"The concept of neutrality can lead to a brooding and pervasive devotion to the secular and a passive, or even active, hostility to the religious. Such results are not only not compelled by the Constitution, but, it seems to me, are prohibited by it"

Arthur J. Goldberg, Judge

"Members of weakly religious families get, of course, no religious training from any source outside the family"

Gregory Bateson, Scientist

"However, intention needn't enter in, and if a reader sees things in a religious way, and the work is dogmatically acceptable, then I don't see why it should not be interpreted in that way, as well as in others"

James Schuyler, Poet

"While even pornography is protected as free speech, the courts have consciously undermined religious speech and freedom of religion for years"

Ernest Istook, Politician

"But certainly in Uganda, Mozambique and South Africa, people don't really talk about sex and certainly religious leaders - some of them - up to now have been very unwilling to accept, for instance, the promotion of condom use"

Emma Thompson, Actress

"We're not at a point in time to be taking chances with children and young people in the church. The Holy Father himself said... there is no room in the priesthood or religious life for someone who has abused a child. I think he's right"

Roger Mahony, Clergyman

"Those people who want to express their religious beliefs on public property should enjoy the same rights that we provide to those protesting the war in Iraq"

Ernest Istook, Politician

"I didn't have a very religious family"

Barbara Walters, Journalist

"Our mother was a very religious and observant Jew, our father less so. She was kind of driving the religious education, so for us it was more a burden and an obligation when we were kids at that age"

Joel Coen, Director

"Our society is the product of several great religious and philosophical traditions. The ideas of the Greeks and Romans, Christianity, Judaism, humanism and the Enlightenment have made us who we are"

Jan Peter Balkenende, Statesman

"Though I'm not religious in the classical sense I did partake in Passover"

Fran Drescher, Actress

"I believe that the capital of the Republic of Albania is a suitable venue for discussing the dialogue among religions and civilizations, notably in the countries of South East Europe, because we are well familiar with this country's track record of religious tolerance"

Georgi Purvanov, Statesman

"Unhappy, let alone angry, religious people provide more persuasive arguments for atheism and secularism than do all the arguments of atheists"

Dennis Prager, Journalist

"These men were religious when the spirit of religion was buried in forms and ceremonies, and when the priesthood had armed itself with the civil powers to put down all opposition, and suppress all freedom, intellectual, civil, and religious"

Ethan A. Hitchcock, Soldier

"People truly reaching across boundaries - be they religious or race, political or geographic. A state that is sincerely civil and respectful of each individual's pathway toward life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness will be our goal"

Jon Huntsman, Jr., Politician

"I don't believe in God personally but I have great respect for those people who do and different people have different religious views in this country"

Ed Miliband, Politician

"The word spiritual, not the word religious, is the key"

Clarence Clemons, Musician

"And also a lot of Muslims are no more religious then the average Swede. For them it's natural that human rights come first"

Bjorn Ulvaeus, Musician

"We in the United States should be all the more thankful for the freedom and religious tolerance we enjoy. And we should always remember the lessons learned from the Holocaust, in hopes we stay vigilant against such inhumanity now and in the future"

Charlie Dent, Politician

"The Divine Thing that made itself the foundation of the Church does not seem, to judge by his comments on the religious leadership of his day, to have hoped much from officers of a church"

Charles Williams, Editor

"We are certainly influenced by role models, and if we are surrounded by images of beautiful rich people, we will start to think that to be beautiful and rich is very important - just as in the Middle Ages, people were surrounded by images of religious piety"

Alain de Botton, Writer

"I hope we will not so characterize religious people as being so narrow and so biased towards people not of their own religion that they cannot even work with them in this common cause to which you say they are committed"

Barney Frank, Politician

"The churches... have lost much of their authority over youth because they have refused to re-examine their religious sanctions and their dogmatic preaching in the light of modern physiology, psychology and sociology"

Agnes E. Meyer

"Oddly enough, George Pal always began and ended something with The Bible. All his pictures had a religious undertone. God was always there, protecting us"

Ann Robinson, Actress

"The supreme satisfaction is to be able to despise one's neighbor and this fact goes far to account for religious intolerance. It is evidently consoling to reflect that the people next door are headed for hell"

Aleister Crowley, Critic

"I find it difficult to imagine an afterlife, such as Christians, or at any rate many religious people, conceive it, believing that the conversations with relatives and friends interrupted here on earth will be continued in the hereafter"

Edvard Munch, Painter

"All ideologies are idiotic, whether religious or political, for it is conceptual thinking, the conceptual word, which has so unfortunately divided man"

Jiddu Krishnamurti, Philosopher

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