All Quotes By Tag: God

“So yes, religion has caused and continues to cause some of the worst violence in history. And yes, it has used God to justify it. So if we mean by God the loving creator of the universe, then either he doesn’t exist or religion has got him wrong. Either way, religion should make us wary. That doesn’t necessarily mean we should abandon it altogether. We may decide to stick with it but to do so with humility, admitting the evil it has done as well as the good. It’s up to us.”

“As we have seen so often in this book, religion may begin with mystical experiences but it always leads to politics. It starts with the voice heard by the prophets who are its chosen instruments. And what they hear always leads to actions that affect the way people live: with politics. Sometimes the politics are bad. People are persecuted for following the wrong faith or for listening to the wrong voice. Or they are forced to embrace the message announced by the latest hot prophet. So the history of religion becomes a study in different forms of oppression. But sometimes the politics are good. They are about liberation, not oppression. We saw good politics in the stand the Pennsylvanian Quakers made against slavery in 1688. And in the African American Church today the politics of Christianity are still about liberation. The tactics of Moses and the promises of Jesus are used to make the world a better place. Religion is no longer used as an opiate to dull the pain of injustice and inequality but as a stimulant to overcome it. That’s what keeps many people in the religion game.”

“To think that God pens history solely as a retelling of ‘what was’ is to miss the extraordinary fact that history is God’s initiation to ‘what can be.’ And Christmas is one of the greatest moments in history which renders it one of the greatest invitations of our life.”

“God will always want me more than I will want Him. And it seems quite reasonable to me that the greatest way that I can expend my life is to work on closing that gap.”

“If there is a God, he will have to beg my forgiveness.”

“You are not for any reason less than whom God created you to be, don’t live like a dwarf where you are seen as a giant.”

“How irresponsible of Him to allow terrible things to happen o those who didn’t deserve it. Could God see and hear through prison walls and across cell bars? If He could not, He was not all-powerful. If He could, and still did nothing to help those in need, He was not merciful. Either way, He was not what He claimed to be. He was an impostor.”

“Believers favour answers over questions, clarity over uncertainty. Athiests, more or less the same. Funny, when it comes to God, Whom we know next to nothing about, very few of us actually say, ‘I don’t know.”

“People fear God, retribution, karma, the devil, when really it is only each other they have to fear.”

“I don’t know what’s worse; being afraid to live or being afraid to die. Yet, the thing about Christmas is that it eliminates both.”

“We are deathly afraid of attempting great things, yet on the other hand we are also deathly afraid of missing great things. But the larger question in all of this might be, “Why is it that great things matter to us in the first place?” They matter because God made us for great things.”

“To lead is to serve. Conversely, to serve is to lead. And if either of these elements are removed from the equation, we’ll soon find that we’re doing neither.”

“If I only go as far as I can take myself, I’m not all that certain that I’ve gone much of anywhere at all. But once I dared to look outside of myself, I realized that God hands out unlimited passes to the anywhere of everywhere.”

“Without the goodness of God, how can we be glad?”

“If you want to understand God, then look no further than in the mirror at your home.”