Atheist Quotes - Page 65

Here is book called I Don't Have Enough Faith to Be an Atheist, written by a couple of Christian apologists, which is essentially saying I don't pretend enough to know things I don't know to be an atheist.

How do you know it's not true if you don't believe in it?

Every fanatic or enemy of virtue is not at liberty to misrepresent the greatest geniuses and most heroic defenders of all that is valuable in this mortal world.

Human vanity is so constituted that it stiffens before difficulties. The more an object conceals itself from our eyes, the greater the effort we make to seize it, because it pricks our pride, it excites our curiosity and it appears interesting. In fighting for his God everyone, in fact, fights only for the interest of his own vanity, which, of all the passions produced bye the mal-organization of society, is the quickest to take offense, and the most capable of committing the greatest follies.

I was an infant when my mother went To see an atheist burned. She took me there. The dark-robed priests were met around the pile; The multitude was gazing silently; And as the culprit passed with dauntless mien, Tempered disdain in his unaltering eye, Mixed with a quiet smile, shone calmly forth; The thirsty fire crept round his manly limbs; His resolute eyes were scorched to blindness soon; His death-pang rent my heart! the insensate mob Uttered a cry of triumph, and I wept. Weep not, child! cried my mother, for that man Has said, 'There is no God.'

If you want to turn out an atheist child, unconditional love constantly is a good way to do it.

I reject her [Ayn Rand's] philosophy. It's an atheist philosophy. It reduces human interactions down to mere contracts and it is antithetical to my worldview. If somebody is going to try to paste a person's view on epistemology to me, then give me Thomas Aquinas. Don't give me Ayn Rand.

For years [H.P] Lovecraft was defined as an atheist. Well, he wasn't saying anything about what he really was at all. He wasn't even an agnostic. That's exactly what the situation is, in other words, when you enter an eternal realm. You've got to know there is no religion.

[Nikola Tesla] said he had no interest in the spiritual. He didn't believe in telepathy, didn't believe in any of that stuff, didn't believe in any religion, and he just thought all these people were being superstitious and wanted them to go away. And in that way he was very close to H.P. Lovecraft, who was almost a believing atheist.

Religious liberty in a nation is as real as the liberty of its least popular religious minority. Look not to the size of cathedrals or even to the words on the statute books for proof of the reality of religious freedom. Ask what is the fate of the Protestant in Spain, the Jew in Saudi Arabia, the Arab in Israel, the Catholic in Poland or the atheist in the United States.

I was brought up Catholic. I'm lapsed. From the age of three I was with the nuns. Now I'm an atheist. I think religion does a lot for us but I can't quite believe it, alas... It's just a personal choice. I love the idea of heaven though. Who doesn't? It's lovely.

The village atheist has the right to be heard; he has no right to be heeded. While he has a right not to have his own children indoctrinated in what he believes are false and foolish teachings, he has no right to dictate what other children may be taught.

Death! It is rest to the aged, it is oblivion to the atheist, it is immortality to the poet!

I consider myself a person who comes from a Muslim culture. In any case, I would not say that I'm an atheist. So I'm a Muslim who associates historical and cultural identification with this religion.

Well, I don't call you an atheist then. I think if you believe in the awe and the wonder and the mystery, then that is what God is. That is what God is, not the bearded guy in the sky.

I am an atheist. I don't think there's anything divine. Beautiful, impressive, awe-inspiring - sure, but not divine.

...if you ask me whether or not I'm an atheist, I wouldn't even answer. I would first want an explanation of what it is that I'm supposed not to believe in, and I've never seen an explanation.

I was an atheist and I came to experience a relationship with God which had a radically transforming effect on my life, on my relationships, on every aspect of my life, for the better. So, obviously I hope other people will experience that.

The Omen is one of my favorites. Even though I'm an atheist now, I was brought up Catholic and can remember thinking that it could actually be real! The first Dawn of the Dead is a great one. We had a TV serial in Britain called Day of the Triffids and that was always really terrifying for me as well.

So when people tell you, oh, you can't have the Ten Commandments on public property, they're just wrong. It's historically false. It's not true. Now, you can decide to invent a new America in which you shouldn't say "one nation under God" as part of the pledge because, after all, you will offend three atheists. But that's not the America you inherited. That's a different country. And I think it's a weaker country and I think it's a country that has no roots in terms of where its rights come from.

And then he'd tried to become an official Atheist and hadn't got the rock-hard self-satisfied strength of belief even for that.

You ask people, do you pray to [a person or] God. If you say yes to that, you're religious by, presumably, anybody's standards of your conduct. And it's the yes to that question that applies to 40% of scientists. So, there're plenty of atheists who are scientists or not scientists. There maybe a conflict but many people in this country coexist in both worlds.

As [The Nation columnist Katha] Pollitt points out, when one starts looking beneath the surface of things and adding together the out-front atheists with the indifferent nonbelievers, you end up with a much larger group of people than Jews, Muslims, Buddhists and Unitarians put together.

I am an atheist, although I very much admire and have been influenced by many traditionally religious people.

I think at least two of [my kids] - and I'm - I better not speak them by name because I'm not sure where they are these days, but at least two of them believe in some kind of higher force. The - another is an atheist and the other is still pondering.