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Read through the most famous quotes by topic #religion
When the late Pope John Paul II decided to place the woman so strangely known as “Mother” Teresa on the fast track for beatification, and thus to qualify her for eventual sainthood, the Vatican felt obliged to solicit my testimony and I thus spent several hours in a closed hearing room with a priest, a deacon, and a monsignor, no doubt making their day as I told off, as from a rosary, the frightful faults and crimes of the departed fanatic. In the course of this, I discovered that the pope during his tenure had surreptitiously abolished the famous office of “Devil’s Advocate,” in order to fast‐track still more of his many candidates for canonization. I can thus claim to be the only living person to have represented the Devil pro bono. ↗
#beatification #canonisation #deacons #devil #devil-s-advocate
عليك بالمطالب العالية والمراتب السامية التي لا تنال إلا بطاعة الله، فإن الله عز وجل قضى أن لا ينال ما عنده إلا بطاعته. ومن كان لله كما يريد كان الله له فوق ما يريد، فمن أقبل عليه تلقاه من بعيد، ومن تصرف بحوله وقوته ألان له الحديد، ومن ترك لأجله أعطاه فوق المزيد، ومن أراد مراده الديني أراد ما يريد ↗
Since Jimmy Carter, religious fundamentalists play a major role in elections. He was the first president who made a point of exhibiting himself as a born again Christian. That sparked a little light in the minds of political campaign managers: Pretend to be a religious fanatic and you can pick up a third of the vote right away. Nobody asked whether Lyndon Johnson went to church every day. Bill Clinton is probably about as religious as I am, meaning zero, but his managers made a point of making sure that every Sunday morning he was in the Baptist church singing hymns. ↗
Why are those who are notoriously undisciplined and unmoral also most contemptuous of religion and morality? They are trying to solace their own unhappy lives by pulling the happy down to their own abysmal depths. ↗
Currently spirituality is at an ebb in the more advanced technological societies. This in part because memes that validate spiritual order tend to lose their credibility with time, and need to be recast in new forms again and again. At present we are living in an era when many of the basic tenents of Christianity, which has supported Western spiritual values for almost two thousand yearsm have come into conflict with the conclusions of science and philosophy. While religions have lost much of their power, science and technology have not been able to generate convincing value systems to replace them. ↗
I sucked that smoke in and made it part of me, joined mystically with the universe right at that point, said Yes to drugs forever just by the unique hit I got from that one packet of fags Andy liberated from his dad. It was a revelation, an epiphany; a sudden realisation that it was possible for matter - something there in front of you, in your hand, in your lungs, in your pocket - to take your brain apart and reassemble it in ways you hadn't thought of previously. This was better than religion, or this was what people meant by religion! The whole point was that this worked! People said Believe In God or Do Well At School or Buy This or Vote For Me or whatever, but nothing ever worked the way substances worked, nothing ever fucking delivered the way they did. They were truth. Everything else was falsehood. ↗
گوشه‌ي اولين صفحه‌ي كتابي كه باز كردم، نوشته بود: در خبر است كه حق جلّ جلاله سه نام از نام‌هاي خود به ابراهيم فرستاد؛ يكي از آن «آه» بود كه ابراهيم بر دوام مي‌گفتي: آه. اگر تندرستان و اهل سلامت را نود و نه نام بيايد، نود و نه همه از زبان برآيد، اما آه از ميان جان برآيد. زبان و كام را به آه، راه نيست. . وقتي مي‌گويند تو جاي حق نشسته‌اي، يعني همين؟ آه، اسم تو باشد يا نباشد، هُرم نفس‌هاي عاشقان، دلسوختگان، ستمديدگان و بي‌پناهان است. و اين حكايت تمثيلي است از اين كه تو در نفس‌هاي هر عاشقي، هر بي‌پناه و دلسوخته و سرگشته‌اي هستي و به قدر نفسي حتي چشم از آنها برنمي‌داري... براي همين‌هاست كه دوستت دارم وقتي آن قدر حضورت در زندگي‌ها تماشايي است كه آه مي‌شود نامي از نام‌هاي تو. كدام كس را مي‌شناسي كه «آه» نگويد؟! چه تو را بشناسد، چه نه! و چه بداند به هر آهي كه مي‌كشد صدايت كرده يا نداند! آه نام توست! حتي اگر آنها كه آه مي‌گويند ندانند تو را صدا مي‌زنند، تو، خودت كه مي‌داني. جواب مي‌دهي سلام؛ شايد. شايد براي اين است كه آه كشيدن، آراممان مي‌كند. هر بار آه مي‌كشيم، تو همين جا سلام مي‌گويي. و ما آرام مي‌شويم. اگر نشد رمضاني را به جشن بنشينم، به جشن سخن گفتن تو با زمين، با مردم، با انسان؛ اگر نشد مهماني تو را شبيه پرشكوه‌ترين مهماني انساني و روحاني پاي بكوبم، تمامش را آه مي‌كشم تا آني، و كمتر از آني از يادت خالي نشوم.ه ↗
Along with the mystical wonderment and sense of ecological responsibility that comes with the recognition of connectedness, more disturbing images come to mind. When applied to economics, connectedness seems to take the form of chain stores, multinational corporations, and international trade treaties which wipe out local enterprise and indigenous culture. When I think of it in the realm of religion, I envision smug missionaries who have done such a good job of convincing native people everywhere that their World-Maker is the same as God, and by this shoddy sleight of hand have been steadily impoverishing the world of the great fecundity and complex localism of belief systems that capture truths outside the Western canon. And I wonder—if everything's connected, does that mean that everything can be manipulated and controlled centrally by those who know how to pull strings at strategic places? ↗
On the black earth on which the ice plants bloomed, hundreds of black stink bugs crawled. And many of them stuck their tails up in the air. "Look at all them stink bugs," Hazel remarked, grateful to the bugs for being there. "They're interesting," said Doc. "Well, what they got their asses up in the air for?" Doc rolled up his wool socks and put them in the rubber boots and from his pocket he brought out dry socks and a pair of thin moccasins. "I don't know why," he said. "I looked them up recently--they're very common animals and one of the commonest things they do is put their tails up in the air. And in all the books there isn't one mention of the fact that they put their tails up in the air or why." Hazel turned one of the stink bugs over with the toe of his wet tennis shoe and the shining black beetle strove madly with floundering legs to get upright again. "Well, why do you think they do it?" "I think they're praying," said Doc. "What!" Hazel was shocked. "The remarkable thing," said Doc, "isn't that they put their tails up in the air--the really incredibly remarkable thing is that we find it remarkable. We can only use ourselves as yardsticks. If we did something as inexplicable and strange we'd probably be praying--so maybe they're praying." "Let's get the hell out of here," said Hazel. ↗
Let me speak plainly: The United States of America is and must remain a nation of openness to people of all beliefs. Our very unity has been strengthened by this pluralism. That's how we began; this is how we must always be. The ideals of our country leave no room whatsoever for intolerance, anti-Semitism, or bigotry of any kind -- none. The unique thing about America is a wall in our Constitution separating church and state. It guarantees there will never be a state religion in this land, but at the same time it makes sure that every single American is free to choose and practice his or her religious beliefs or to choose no religion at all. Their rights shall not be questioned or violated by the state. -- Remarks at the International Convention of B'nai B'rith, 6 September 1984 ↗
