Quotes by Activists - Page 81

I trust, and I recognize the beneficence of the power which we all worship as supreme- Order, Fate, the Great Spirit, Nature, God. I recognize this power in the sun that makes all things grow and keeps life afoot. I make a friend of this indefinable force…this is my religion of optimism.
Helen Keller
Accumulating orthodoxy makes it harder year-by-year to be a Christian than it was in Jesus' day.
Brian D. McLaren
Christ came to take away our sins, not our minds.
William Sloane Coffin Jr.
But Jesus makes his appearance here only as a corpse; the living man, the wine-guzzling vagrant and precocious socialist, is never once mentioned, nor anything he ever had to say. Christ crucified rules, and it may be that the true business of modern Christianity is to crucify him again and again so that he can never get a word out of his mouth.
Barbara Ehrenreich
Religion is for those who are scared of hell, and spirituality is for those who have been there.
Bonnie Raitt
Thank you for this precious day,These gifts you give to me,My heart so full of love for you,Sings praise for all I see,Oh, sing, for every mother's love,For every childhood tear,Oh, sing, for all the stars above,The peace beyond all fear
John Denver
Why does a young Muslim, in the prime of life, with a full life ahead, go and blow himself up in a bus full of innocent passengers? In our countries, religion is the sole source of education, and this is the only spring from which that terrorist drank until his thirst was quenched. He was not born a terrorist, and did not become a terrorist overnight. Islamic teachings played a role in weaving his ideological fabric, thread by thread, and did not allow other sources—I am referring to scientific sources—to play a role. It was these teachings that distorted this terrorist, and killed his humanity; it was not [the terrorist] who distorted the religious teachings, and misunderstood them, as some ignorant people claim. When you recite to a child still in his early years the verse 'They will be killed or crucified, or have their hands and feet on alternative sides cut off,' regardless of this verse's interpretation, and regardless of the reasons it was conveyed, or its time, you have made the first step towards creating a great terrorist.
Wafa Sultan
Infuriatingly stupid analysts - especially people who called themselves Arabists, yet who seemed to know next to nothing about the reality of the Islamic world - wrote reams of commentary [after 9/11]. Their articles were all about Islam saving Aristotle and the zero, which medieval Muslim scholars had done more than eight hundred years ago; about Islam being a religion of peace and tolerance, not the slightest bit violent. These were fairy tales, nothing to do with the real world I knew.
Ayaan Hirsi Ali
Those who say religion has nothing to do with politics do not know what religion is.
Mahatma Gandhi
You believe in a book that has talking animals, wizards, witches, demons, sticks turning into snakes, food falling from the sky, people walking on water, and all sorts of magical, absurd and primitive stories, and you say that we are the ones that need help?
Dan Barker
Some people believe the alternative to bad religion is secularism, but that's wrong . . . . The answer to bad religion is better religion--prophetic rather than partisan, broad and deep instead of narrow, and based on values as opposed to ideology.
Jim Wallis
If I were a dictator, religion and state would be separate. I swear by my religion. I will die for it. But it is my personal affair. The state has nothing to do with it. The state would look after your secular welfare, health, communications, foreign relations, currency and so on, but not your or my religion. That is everybody's personal concern!
Mahatma Gandhi
...Bin Laden's quotes from the Quaran resonated in my brain: "When you meet the unbelievers, strike them in the neck." "If you do not go out and fight, God will punish you severely and put others in your place." "Wherever you find the polytheists, kill them, seize them, besiege them, ambush them." "You who believe, do not take the Jews and Christians as friends; they are allies only to each other. Anyone who takes them as an ally becomes one of them.
Ayaan Hirsi Ali
If Atheism is a religion, then health is a disease!
Clark Adams
A disciple came to the celebrated Master of the Good Name with a question. “Rabbi, how are we to distinguish between a true master and a fake?” And the master of the good name said, “When you meet a person who poses as a master, ask him a question: whether he knows how to purify your thoughts. If he says that he knows, then he is a fake.
Elie Wiesel
I’m sure I am wrong about many things, although I’m not sure exactly which things I’m wrong about. I’m even sure I’m wrong about what I think I’m right about in at least some cases.
Brian D. McLaren
I have something to say to the religionist who feels atheists never say anything positive: You are an intelligent human being. Your life is valuable for its own sake. You are not second-class in the universe, deriving meaning and purpose from some other mind. You are not inherently evil—you are inherently human, possessing the positive rational potential to help make this a world of morality, peace and joy. Trust yourself.
Dan Barker
If no one had ever challenged religious authority, there’d be no democracy, no public schools, women’s rights, improvements to science and medicine, evolution of slavery and no laws against child abuse or spousal abuse. I was afraid to challenge my religious beliefs because that was the basis of creation—mine anyway. I was afraid to question the Bible or anything in it, and when I did, that’s when I became involved with PFLAG and realized that my son was a perfectly normal human being and there was nothing for God to heal because Bobby was perfect just the way he was.
Mary Griffith
When I was in my single digits, I was subjected to the worst torture you can possibly inflict on a child: Catholic mass.
Tyler Oakley
Allah is the Greatest. I'm just the greatest boxer
Muhammad Ali
The morning after the 9/11 attacks...we began talking about the Twin Towers attack. Ruud shook his head sadly about it all. He said, "It's so weird, isn't it, all these people saying this has to do with Islam?" I couldn't help myself...I blurted out, "But it *is* about Islam. This is based in belief. This is Islam." Ruud said, "Ayaan, of course these people may have been Muslims, but they are a lunatic fringe. We have extremist Christians, too, who interpret the bible literally. Most Muslims do not believe these things. To say so is to disparage a faith which is the second largest religion in the world, and which is civilized, and peaceful." I walked into the office thinking, "I have to wake these people up."...The Dutch had forgotten that it was possible for people to stand up and wage war, destroy property, imprison, kill, impose laws of virtue because of the call of God. That kind of religion hadn't been present in Holland for centuries. It was not a lunatic fringe who felt this way about America and the West. I knew that a vast mass of Muslims would see the attacks as justified retaliation against the infidel enemies of Islam.
Ayaan Hirsi Ali
A religion that takes no account of practical affairs and does not help to solve them is no religion.
Mahatma Gandhi
Do not worry in the least about yourself, leave all worry to God,' - this appears to be the commandment in all religions. This need not frighten anyone. He who devotes himself to service with a clear conscience, will day by day grasp the necessity for it in greater measure, and will continually grow richer in faith. The path of service can hardly be trodden by one who is not prepared to renounce self-interest, and to recognize the conditions of his birth. Consciously or unconsciously, every one of us does render some service or other. If we cultivate the habit of doing this service deliberately, our desire for service will steadily grow stronger, and will make not only for our own happiness but that of the world at large.
Mahatma Gandhi
No idea is above scrutiny and no people are beneath dignity.
Maajid Nawaz
No wonder male religious leaders so often say that humans were born in sin—because we were born to female creatures. Only by obeying the rules of the patriarchy can we be reborn through men. No wonder priests and ministers in skirts sprinkle imitation birth fluid over our heads, give us new names, and promise rebirth into everlasting life.
Gloria Steinem
It is wonderful how much time good people spend fighting the devil. If they would only expend the same amount of energy loving their fellow men, the devil would die in his own tracks of ennui.
Helen Keller
The next time believers tell you that 'separation of church and state' does not appear in our founding document, tell them to stop using the word 'trinity.' The word 'trinity' appears nowhere in the bible. Neither does Rapture, or Second Coming, or Original Sin. If they are still unfazed (or unphrased), by this, then add Omniscience, Omnipresence, Supernatural,Transcendence, Afterlife, Deity, Divinity, Theology, Monotheism, Missionary, Immaculate Conception, Christmas, Christianity, Evangelical, Fundamentalist, Methodist, Catholic, Pope, Cardinal, Catechism, Purgatory, Penance, Transubstantiation, Excommunication, Dogma, Chastity, Unpardonable Sin, Infallibility, Inerrancy, Incarnation, Epiphany, Sermon, Eucharist, the Lord's Prayer, Good Friday, Doubting Thomas, Advent, Sunday School, Dead Sea, Golden Rule, Moral, Morality, Ethics, Patriotism, Education, Atheism, Apostasy, Conservative (Liberal is in), Capital Punishment, Monogamy, Abortion, Pornography, Homosexual, Lesbian, Fairness, Logic, Republic, Democracy, Capitalism, Funeral, Decalogue, or Bible.
Dan Barker
An atheist believes that a hospital should be built instead of a church. An atheist believes that deed must be done instead of prayer said.An atheist strives for involvement in life and not escape into death. He wants disease conquered, poverty vanished, war eliminated.
Madalyn Murray O'Hair
The fact is that more people have been slaughtered in the name of religion than for any other single reason. That, that my friends, that is true perversion!
Harvey Milk
Yes I am, I am also a Muslim, a Christian, a Buddhist, and a Jew.
Mahatma Gandhi
I call him religious who understands the suffering of others.
Mahatma Gandhi
It is easy enough to be friendly to one's friends. But to befriend the one who regards himself as your enemy is the quintessence of true religion. The other is mere business.
Mahatma Gandhi
The resistance, though it comes in many forms, begins with the mistaken belief that I am somehow separate from change, and that I can control it, rather than to align myself with change as it makes itself apparent, and ride it.
Sharon Weil
We cannot protect ourselves from disappointment and still live a fully engaged life.
Sharon Weil
Given that I don’t know anything, when I am making up stories about the future, why not make it a good story instead of a scary one?
Sharon Weil
When I act, I act on behalf of who or what I love. Even when I have to fight against something, it is because of what I value and love.
Sharon Weil
Passion is the fire that can burn through fear.
Sharon Weil
We've got to think now, in real terms, for that seventh generation . . . We've got to get back to spiritual law if we are to survive.
Oren Lyons
You do it for yourself. You don’t expect to change the world. You don’t even expect to influence your family or your friends. You do it because you can’t not do it and be who you are. Or who you’re meant to be.
Martin Sheen
The universe is made up of stories, not atoms.
Muriel Rukeyser
La vie est une aventure audacieuse ou alors elle n'est rien.
Helen Keller
In struggling against anguish one never produces serenity the struggle against anguish only produces new forms of anguish.
Simone Weil
All humanity is one undivided and indivisible family. I cannot detach myself from the wickedest soul.
Mahatma Gandhi
The greatness of a nation and its moral progress can be judged by the way its animals are treated. I hold that the more helpless a creature the more entitled it is to protection by man from the cruelty of humankind.
Mahatma Gandhi
All men are created equal. Now matter how hard they try, they can never erase those words. That is what America is about.
Harvey Milk
Most good things have already been said far too many times and just need to be lived.
Shane Claiborne
Whining is not only graceless, but can be dangerous. It can alert a brute that a victim is in the neighborhood.
Maya Angelou
When the whole world is silent, even one voice becomes powerful.
Malala Yousafzai
When we give cheerfully and accept gratefully, everyone is blessed.
Maya Angelou
We delight in the beauty of the butterfly, but rarely admit the changes it has gone through to achieve that beauty.
Maya Angelou
Courage is the most important of all the virtues because without courage, you can't practice any other virtue consistently.
Maya Angelou
To give pleasure to a single heart by a single act is better than a thousand heads bowing in prayer.
Mahatma Gandhi
Write what will stop your breath if you don’t write.
Grace Paley
Writing is one of the ways I participate in transformation.
Toni Cade Bambara
If you're a writer, the answer to everything is yes.
Nikki Giovanni
The voice of a Black woman should always be HERSELF ...No edits - no erasure - no pressure - no expectations - no additions - no intruders
Malebo Sephodi
To write is to carve a new path through the terrain of the imagination, or to point out new features on a familiar route. To read is to travel through that terrain with the author as a guide-- a guide one might not always agree with or trust, but who can at least be counted on to take one somewhere.
Rebecca Solnit
Write a lot and hit the streets. A writer who doesn't keep up with what's out there ain't gonna be out there.
Toni Cade Bambara
Novels for me are how I find out what's going on in my own head. And so that's a really useful and indeed critical thing to do when you do as many of these other things as I do.
Cory Doctorow
You write your books. You scatter your seeds. Rats might eat them, or they might rot. In California, some seeds lie dormant for decades because they only germinate after fire, and sometimes the burned landscape blooms most lavishly.
Rebecca Solnit