#religion

It is not miracles that dispose realists to belief. The genuine realist, if he is an unbeliever, will always find strength and ability to disbelieve in the miraculous, and if he is confronted with a miracle as an irrefutable fact he would rather disbelieve his own senses than admit the fact. Even if he admits it, he admits it as a fact of nature till then unrecognized by him. Faith does not, in the realist, spring from the miracle but the miracle from faith. If the realist once believes, then he is bound by his very realism to admit the miraculous also. ↗

— Fyodor Dostoyevsky

#faith

But my lazy lack of faith, my in-vogue atheism, has taken away the safety net hanging beneath our children's lives. ↗

— Rosamund Lupton

#faith #god #religion #faith

Many married women who have deliberately spurned the "hour" of childbearing are unhappy and frustrated. They never discovered the joys of marriage because they refused to surrender to the obligation of their state. In saving themselves, they lost themselves! ↗

— Fulton J. Sheen

#childbirth #christianity #expectation #family-planning #happiness

I used to think that kid might become a preacher. Now I don't see how he's going to stay out of prison. Nobody in this family ever went to prison for sex crimes. He'd be the first." Yes," says Jesus, "you never know about these things." He and Grandpa are drinking cups of coffee and eating ginger snaps. Grandpa says, "When are you planning to return to earth?" Soon as I finish this coffee," say Jesus. "Pretty good, isn't it. ↗

— Garrison Keillor

#religion #family

The only thing that guarantees an open-ended collaboration among human beings, the only thing that guarantees that this project is truly open-ended, is a willingness to have our beliefs and behaviors modified by the power of conversation. ↗

— Sam Harris

#atheism #belief #ethics #faith #humanism

In all times, and all countries especially in those countries which are divided within by religious faith, there are always fanatics who will be well contented to be regarded as martyrs. ↗

— Alexandre Dumas

#martyrs #religion #faith

Kindness is a mark of faith, whoever is not; has no faith. ↗

— Muhammad (PBUH)

#islam #kindness #muhammad #religion #faith

We rely on faith only in the context of claims for which there is no sufficient sensory or logical evidence. ↗

— Sam Harris

#atheism #belief #ethics #humanism #religion

Faith is the surrender of the mind, it's the surrender of reason, it's the surrender of the only thing that makes us different from other animals. It's our need to believe and to surrender our skepticism and our reason, our yearning to discard that and put all our trust or faith in someone or something, that is the sinister thing to me. ... Out of all the virtues, all the supposed virtues, faith must be the most overrated ↗

— Christopher Hitchens

#atheism #faith #mammals #religion #virtue

I am more afraid that this people have so much confidence in their leaders that they will not inquire for themselves of God whether they are led by him. I am fearful they settle down in a state of blind self security. Let every man and woman know, by the whispering of the Spirit of God to themselves, whether their leaders are walking in the path the Lord dictates, or not. ↗

— Brigham Young

#knowledge #religion #spirituality #faith