#religion

the living used to wonder what happened after death. She said that whole religions were born and evolved around this one simple uncertainty. ↗

— Carrie Ryan

#living #religion #uncertainty #wonder #death

I am hungry for power, but not to lord over others; only to own myself. ↗

— Deborah Feldman

#freedom-of-expression #freedom-of-religion #hunger #jewish #jews

Considering he was neither priest nor scholar, the young man gave sensible, thoughtful replies -- the more so, perhaps, for being untrained, for he had not learned what he should believe or should not believe. Present a statement to him in flagrant contradiction to all Christian doctrine and he could be persuaded to agree on its good sense, unless he remembered it was the sort of thing of which pyres are made for the incautious. ↗

— Iain Pears

#doctrine #education #freedom #freedom-of-religion #freedom-of-thought

Let us see rather that like Janus—or better, like Yama, the Brahmin god of death—religion has two faces, one very friendly, one very gloomy... ↗

— Arthur Schopenhauer

#religion #schopenhauer #yama #death

Gravity explains the motions of the planets, but it cannot explain who sets the planets in motion. ↗

— Isaac Newton

#intelligent-design #religion #religion-and-science #science #science-and-religion

To imagine the world without gods and religion is reasonable enough; to imagine mankind without them is an entirely different matter. ↗

— Anthony Marais

#imagination

Mohammad never assigned himself a status more than a common man and a messenger of God. People had faith in him when he was surrounded by poverty and adversity and trusted him while he was the ruler of a great Empire. He was a man of spotless character who always had confidence in himself and in God's help. No aspect of his life remained hidden nor was his death a mysterious event. ↗

— M.H. Hyndman

#atheist #christian #confidence #death #empire

The free animal has its dying always behind it and God in front of it, and its way is the eternal way, as the spring flowing. Never, not for a moment, do we have pure space before us, where the flowers endlessly open. ↗

— Rainer Maria Rilke

#death #religion #death

As surely as I feel love and need for food and water, I feel love and need for God. But these feelings have nothing to do with Supramundane Males planning torments for those who don't abide by neocon "moral values." I hold the evangelical truth of our situation to be that contemporary politicized fundamentalists, including first and foremost those aimed at Empire and Armageddon, need us non-fundamentalists, mystics, ecosystem activists, unprogrammable artists, agnostic humanitarians, incorrigible writers, truth-telling musicians, incorruptible scientists, organic gardeners, slow food farmers, gay restaurateurs, wilderness visionaries, pagan preachers of sustainability, compassion-driven entrepreneurs, heartbroken Muslims, grief-stricken children, loving believers, loving disbelievers, peace-marching millions, and the One who loves us all in such a huge way that it is not going too far to say: they need us for their salvation. ↗

— David James Duncan

#mystics #peace #religion #salvation #spirituality

Tertullian said of Christian belief that it was true because it was impossible. Perhaps love is essential because it's unnecessary. ↗

— Julian Barnes

#religion #love