Best 2951 quotes in «atheism quotes» category

In contemporary society secular humanism has been singled out by critics and proponents alike as a position sharply distinguishable from any religious formulation. Religious fundamentalists in the United States have waged a campaign against secular humanism, claiming that it is a rival "religion" and seeking to root it out from American public life. Secular humanism is avowedly non-religious. It is a eupraxsophy (good practical wisdom), which draws its basic principles and ethical values from science, ethics, and philosophy.

Indeed, one modern President abjured God altogether, ending speeches with a chaste 'Thank you very much.' This was Jimmy Carter, the most genuinely devout President of the postwar period.

Indeed, when religious people quarrel about religion, or hungry people quarrel about victuals, it looks as if they had not much of either among them.

I never cease being dumbfounded by the unbelievable things people believe.

I never outgrew my conversion to atheism at 13, but at various times was a serious cultural Jew.

In every age 'the good old days' were a myth. No one ever thought they were good at the time. For every age has consisted of crises that seemed intolerable to the people who lived through them.

In fact, it is a farce to call any being virtuous whose virtues do not result from the exercise of its own reason.

In fact, words are well adapted for description and the arousing of emotion, but for many kinds of precise thought other symbols are much better.

In good philosophy, the word cause ought to be reserved to the single Divine impulse that has formed the universe.

In Jerusalem, the various modes of worship essentially stood for the same cause but were equally hateful to one another. They never served as a unifying factor. Their adherents were equally manipulated by the clergies to regard the others as wicked infidels or idolaters. The centuries passed in constant pious agitation and in frequent religious wars.

In making up my mind as to what Mr. Lincoln really believed, I do not take into consideration the evidence of unnamed persons or the contents of anonymous letters; I take the testimony of those who knew and loved him, of those to whom he opened his heart and to whom he spoke in the freedom of perfect confidence.

In matters of religion, it is very easy to deceive a man and very hard to undeceive him.

In my own experience, I have been amazed to see how unrealistic are the bases for political opinion in general. Only rarely have I found a person who has chosen any particular political party - democratic or totalitarian - through study and comparison of principles.

In order to exist just once in the world, it is necessary never again to exist.

In our country we ask no toleration for religion and its free exercise, but we claim it as an inalienable right.

In Philadelphia, I inadvertently came upon an edition of Robert Ingersoll's Essays and Lectures. This was an exciting discovery; his atheism confirmed my own belief that the horrific cruelty of the Old Testament was degrading to the human spirit.

In regard to religion, mutual toleration in the different professions thereof is what all good and candid minds in all ages have ever practiced, and both by precept and example inculcated on mankind.

In the absence of evidence, the scientist says, 'I don't know,' but the religionist says, 'I believe.'

In short, evolution is as close to being a scientific fact as is possible for any theory, given that science is open - ended and no one can predict with certainty what may change in the future. The prospect that evolution by natural selection, at least as a broad mechanism, will be overthrown in the future is about as likely as the prospect of finding out some day that the Earth is really flat. Unfortunately, those who regard these scientific facts as a threat to faith have chosen to distort and misrepresent them to the public.

Intellectuals cannot tolerate the chance event, the unintelligible: they have a nostalgia for the absolute, for a universally comprehensive scheme.

In religion, What damned error but some sober brow Will bless it, and approve it with a text, Hiding the grossness with fair ornament?

In that we say he [Christ] made whole the lame, the paralytic, and those born blind, we seem to say what is very similar to the deeds said to have been done by Esculapius.

In the crowd, herd, or gang, it is a mass-mind that operates-which is to say, a mind without subtlety, a mind without compassion, a mind, finally, uncivilized.

In the day-to-day trenches of adult life, there is actually no such thing as atheism. There is no such thing as not worshipping. Everybody worships. The only choice we get is what to worship.

In the early 50s in the US, there was what was called McCarthyism and the only reason it succeeded was that there was no resistance to it. When they tried the same thing in the 60s it instantly collapsed because people simply laughed at it so they couldn't do it. Even a dictatorship can't do everything it wants. It's got to have some degree of popular support.

In the absence of fear there is little faith.

In the experiences of a year of the Presidency, there has come to me no other such unwelcome impression as the manifest religious intolerance which exists among many of our citizens. I hold it to be a menace to the very liberties we boast and cherish.

In the middle 1970s an astronomer I admire put together a modest manifesto called "Objections to Astrology" and asked me to endorse it. I struggled with his wording, and in the end found myself unable to sign, not because I thought astrology has any validity whatever, but because I felt (and still feel) that the tone of the statement was authoritarian.

In theology we must consider the predominance of authority; in philosophy the predominance of reason.

In theology, the state of a luckless mortal prenatally damned. The doctrine of reprobation was taught by Calvin, whose joy in it was somewhat marred by the sad sincerity of his conviction that although some are foredoomed to perdition, others are predestined to salvation.

In this metropolis a number of lurking leeches infamously gain subsistence by practicing on the credulity of women.

In the presence of death I affirm and reaffirm the truth of all that I have said against the superstitions of the world. I would say that much on the subject with my last breath.

In this infinite space is placed our universe (whether by chance, by necessity, or by providence I do not now consider).

In this world him who does not abandon himself the Almighty will not desert. Him who helps himself will the Almighty always also help; He will show him the way by which he can gain his rights, his freedom, and therefore his future.

In the theater you create a moment, but in that moment, there is a touch, a twinkle of eternity. And not just eternity, but community. . . . That connection is a sense of life for me.

In this climate - with belief in guardian angels and creationism becoming commonplace - making fun of religion is as risky as burning a flag in an American Legion hall.

In Torch Song, I did that character almost non-stop from 1978 until I made the movie in 1987. Then I had some failure, which also colors how you react to doing other things.

... inventions and purely human institutions.

I once heard the survivors of a colony of ants that had been partially obliterated by a cow's foot seriously debating the intention of the gods towards their civilization.

I once wanted to become an atheist, but I gave up - they have no holidays.

I object to religion in science classrooms not because it's religion but because it's not science.

I pray you, magnificent Sir, do not trouble yourself to return to us, but await our coming to you.

I, personally, am unable to accept any revealed religion, Christian or not.

I prefer rationalism to atheism. The question of God and other objects-of-faith are outside reason and play no part in rationalism, thus you don't have to waste your time in either attacking or defending.

I protect my right to be a Catholic by preserving your right to believe as a Jew, a Protestant, or non-believer, or as anything else you choose. We know that the price of seeking to force our beliefs on others is that they might some day force theirs on us.

I really believe in non-violence, but I also believe in a short of resistance that has to be respectful.

I read the other day an account of a meeting between John Knox and John Calvin. Imagine a dialogue between a pestilence and a famine!

I regard irreligious people as pioneers. If there had been no priesthood the world would have advanced ten thousand times better than it has now.

I regret my disbelief in God.

I shall be glad then to find a hole to creep out of the world.