Religion is too important a matter to its devotees to be a subject of ridicule. If they indulge in absurdities, they are to be pitied rather than ridiculed. — Immanuel Kant
Religions are illogical primitive ignorance. There is nothing as ridiculous and tragic as a religious government. — Leon Trotsky
Religion is a history of wickedness that has served to corrupt and brutalize humankind; and, for my part, I sincerely detest it as I detest everything that is cruel. — Thomas Paine
Religions are all alike- founded upon fables and mythologies. — Thomas Jefferson
Cruel persecutions and intolerance are not accidents, but grow out of the very essence of religion, namely, its absolute claims. — Morris Raphael Cohen
One's political views and/or religious beliefs should not exist in an impenetrable and inviolable bubble wherein they are protected from criticism or scrutiny. — Gad Saad
Religion is fundamentally opposed to everything I hold in veneration - courage, clear thinking, honesty, fairness, and, above all, love of the truth. — H. L. Mencken
Nothing exposes religion more to the reproach of its enemies than the worldliness and half-heartedness of the professors of it. — Matthew Henry
No idea is above scrutiny. No idea whatsoever. To criticize, to scrutinize and to satirize my own religion [Islam] is not Islamophobia. — Maajid Nawaz
The tendency to turn human judgments into divine commands makes religion one of the most dangerous forces in the world. — Georgia Harkness
All religions are ancient monuments to superstition, ignorance and ferocity. — Baron d'Holbach
So far as the religion of the day is concerned, it is a damned fake ... Religion is all bunk. — Thomas A. Edison
Progressives consider it laudable to criticize, mock, or insult all religious beliefs – except for the one untouchable faith. To attack Islam in the West is 'Islamophobic,' 'racist,' and 'bigoted.' — Gad Saad
Religion poisons everything good in this world. — Unknown Author
Short Religion Criticism Quotes
Religion idolizes concepts and avoids personal experience. — Bill Johnson
The religion that is afraid of science dishonors God and commits suicide. — Ralph Waldo Emerson
Religion is the impotence of the human mind to deal with occurrences it cannot understand. — Karl Marx
Religious belief is without reason and without dignity, and its record is near-universally dreadful. — Martin Amis
Religion is like drugs, it destroys the thinking mind. — George Carlin
To criticize, to scrutinize, and to satirize my own religion Islam is not Islamophobia. — Maajid Nawaz
Religion is not merely the opium of the masses, it's the cyanide. — Tom Robbins
All religion, my friend, is simply evolved out of fraud, fear, greed, imagination, and poetry. — Edgar Allan Poe
I would like to say that that even the teachings of the Koran cannot be exempted from criticism. — Mahatma Gandhi
Accept both compliments and criticism. It takes both sun and rain for a flower to grow.
Criticism Of Religion Quotes
In a free society, people should have the right to criticize a religion; they should have the right to do so, and of course their criticisms are themselves open to criticism; that is the essence of freedom of speech and thought. — Gad Saad
I can criticize your religion all I want, and you can criticize mine. I don't like this whole climate of, 'You can't ever say anything bad about the group I'm in, cause every group is untouchable.' We can all criticize each other and engage in debate all we want. — Kathy Griffin
Curtailment of free speech is rationalized on grounds that a more compelling American tradition forbids criticism of the government when the nation is at war... Nothing can be more destructive of our fundamental democratic traditions than the vicious effort to silence dissenters. — Martin Luther King, Jr.
Do what you feel in your heart to be right, for you’ll be criticized anyways.
The most important thing is to know how to awaken in the still undeveloped masses an intelligent attitude towards religious questions and an intelligent criticism of religions. — Vladimir Lenin
The mildest criticism of religion is also the most radical and the most devastating one. Religion is man-made. — Christopher Hitchens
Their [the new atheists] treatment of the religious viewpoint is pathetic to the point of non-being. Richard Dawkins in The God Delusion would fail any introductory philosophy or religion course. Proudly he criticizes that whereof he knows nothing. — Michael Ruse
Animals are such agreeable friends - they ask no questions, they pass no criticisms.
In every society in human history, including the United States, those in power seek to imbue themselves with the attributes of religion and patriotism as a way of getting greater support for their policy and insulating themselves from any criticism. — George J. Mitchell
Man makes religion, religion does not make man — Karl Marx
Redemption is promised at the low price of surrender of your critical faculties. — Sayings
Religion has the capacity to silence critical thinking and create blindness in entire groups of people. It can infect the minds of followers so completely as to allow the most egregious sexual acts against children and others to go unchallenged for centuries. — Darrel Ray
Against Religion Quotes
The deepest sin against the human mind is to believe things without evidence. — Aldous Huxley
Pit race against race, religion against religion, prejudice against prejudice. Divide and conquer! We must not let that happen here. — Eleanor Roosevelt
I wore black because I liked it. I still do, and wearing it still means something to me. It's still my symbol of rebellion -- against a stagnant status quo, against our hypocritical houses of God, against people whose minds are closed to others' ideas. — Johnny Cash
What you feel about another person, what you think or say about another eprson, what you do to another person - you do to you. Give judgement and criticism and you give it to yourself. Give love and appreciation to another person or anything, and you give it to yourself.
The reason people use a crucifix against vampires is because vampires are allergic to bullshit. — Richard Pryor
...he [Muhammad] declared undistinguishing and exterminating war, as a part of his religion, against all the rest of mankind...The precept of the Koran is, perpetual war against all who deny, that Mahomet is the prophet of God. — John Quincy Adams
The devil is not fighting religion. He´s too smart for that. He is producing a counterfeit Christianity, so much like the real one that good Christians are afraid to speak out against it. — Vance Havner
Nothing happens by accident. God is preparing you for great things.
I found enormous opposition to my religion. It's like if you want to strengthen your biceps, you lift heavy weight, as heavy as you can handle, and work your muscles against resistance until it grows strong. I had to do that with my religion. — Ricardo Montalban
Those who live by mystery & charlatanerie, fearing you would render them useless by simplifying the Christian philosophy - the most sublime and benevolent, but most perverted system that ever shone on man - endeavored to crush your well-earned & well-deserved fame. — Thomas Jefferson
Man once surrendering his reason, has no remaining guard against absurdities the most monstrous, and like a ship without rudder, is the sport of every wind. With such persons, gullibility, which they call faith, takes the helm from the hand of reason, and the mind becomes a wreck. — Thomas Jefferson
This I must fight against: any idea, religion, or government which limits or destroys the individual. — John Steinbeck
Religion Today Quotes
If Jesus had preached the same message that ministers preach today, He would never have been crucified. — Leonard Ravenhill
Speaking in tongues is not enough.If we turn men from unchristian religions to christianity we must produce miracles which convince men that Christ lives and He is real today. — T.L. Osborn
Indians today are governed by two different ideologies. Their political ideal set in the preamble of the Constitution affirms a life of liberty, equality and fraternity. Their social ideal embodied in their religion denies them. — B. R. Babasaheb Ambedkar
The World is three days: As for yesterday, it has vanished, along with all that was in it. As for tomorrow, you may never see it. As for today, it is yours, so work in it. — Hasan of Basra
Start today by practicing constant conversation with God and continual mediation on his Word. Prayer lets you speak to God; mediation lets God speak to you. — Rick Warren
Evolution is a religion. This was true of evolution in the beginning, and it is true of evolution still today. — Michael Ruse
Today's religion will be the future's mythology. Both believed at one time by many; but proved wrong by the clever. — Steve Crocker
A revival does two things. First, it returns the Church from her backsliding and second, it causes the conversion of men and women; and it always includes the conviction of sin on the part of the Church. What a spell the devil seems to cast over the Church today! — Billy Sunday
This is evangelicalism today: sensual, carnal, unconverted people that have just enough deceptive religion to drive them straight into Hell! Are you that kind of person? Or do you have new affections? — Paul Washer
"The only reason some of us are not exiled or thrown into prison is simply because we do not preach as fervently and as sternly as did Paul, John, Peter R.A. Torrey and others. This modern "santa claus" religion that is sweeping country today is not the religion Jesus taught and John practiced." — Oliver B. Greene
If you talk about race, it does not make you a racist. If you see distinctions between the genders, it does not make you a sexist. If you think critically about a denomination, it does not make you anti-religion. If you accept but don't celebrate homosexuality, it does not make you a homophobe. — Charlton Heston
It's a no win situation. It's a mug's game. The religions have contrived to make it impossible to disagree with them critically without being rude. They play the hurt feelings card at every opportunity. — Daniel Dennett
People really, really hate their religion being criticized. It's as though you've said they had an ugly face; they seem to identify personally with it. — Richard Dawkins
Unless criticism refuses to take itself quite so seriously or at least to permit its readers not to, it will inevitably continue to reflect the finicky canons of the genteel tradition and the depressing pieties of the Culture Religion of Modernism. — Leslie Fiedler
In fact, current cosmological observations indicate that the average density of matter and energy in the universe is equal, within measurement errors, to the critical density for which the total energy of the universe was exactly zero at the beginning. — Victor J. Stenger
Simply disabling specific critical thinking skills is all that is necessary for the god virus [to take control of a person]. — Sayings
Let nobody be afraid of true freedom of thought. Let us be free in thought and criticism; but, with freedom, we are bound to come to the conclusion that science is not antagonistic to religion, but a help to it. — Lord Kelvin
I put a lot of effort into writing 'A Briefer History' at a time when I was critically ill with pneumonia because I think that it's important for scientists to explain their work, particularly in cosmology. This now answers many questions once asked of religion. — Stephen Hawking
Too many younger artists, critics, and curators are fetishizing the sixties, transforming the period into a deformed cult, a fantasy religion, a hip brand, and a crippling disease. — Jerry Saltz
Religion and morality are critical to how students think about politics and form opinions on political issues. — Jeanne Shaheen
A critic is a gong at a railroad crossing clanging loudly and vainly as the train goes by. — Christopher Morley
Bad Religion has never been about criticizing people who are Christian. But we've always been about pointing out the irony and contradictions in Christian theology and the more extreme versions of Christians that seek to challenge modern secularism. — Greg Graffin
Ours is an age of criticism, to which everything must be subjected. The sacredness of religion, and the authority of legislation, are by many regarded as grounds for exemption from the examination by this tribunal, But, if they are exempted, and cannot lay claim to sincere respect, which reason accords only to that which has stood the test of a free and public examination. — Immanuel Kant
In its Roman-era setting, for example, Christianity was so different that critics of the time referred to it as a "superstition" (meaning a bogus or dangerous religion). — Larry Hurtado
Expressions of sharp and even violent criticism of religion and the church have been welcomed, for they usually imply sincerity of thought. If caustic criticism of religious institutions and practices is irreligious, then Amos, Isaiah, and Jesus were very irreligious men. In fact, that is exactly what many of their contemporaries took them to be. — Halford Luccock
Religion must be considered vindicated in a certain way from the attacks of her critics. — William James
Not thinking critically, I assumed that the successful prayers were proof that God answers prayer while the failures were proof that there was something wrong with me. — Dan Barker
The criticism of Religion is the beginning of all criticism — Karl Marx
Among the more irritating consequences of our flagrantly religious society is the special dispensation that mainstream religions receive. We all may talk about religion as a powerful social force, but unlike other similarly powerful institutions, religion is not to be questioned, criticized or mocked. — Natalie Angier
It is taboo in our society to criticize a persons religious faith... these taboos are offensive, deeply unreasonable, but worse than that, they are getting people killed. This is really my concern. My concern is that our religions, the diversity of our religious doctrines, is going to get us killed. I'm worried that our religious discourse- our religious beliefs are ultimately incompatible with civilization. — Sam Harris
I have a reputation worldwide of being tolerant of all people and their views. I'm too well-educated to criticize a certain religion or group of people for what they believe in. It's called freedom. — Robert H. Schuller
I learned from James Baldwin that one can be a novelist, essayist, and activist, combined. That being critical of one's country is a way of loving it. That travel is crucial for perspective. That faith needn't be confined to organized religion. — Emily Raboteau
Contemplation: I read a lot of books on philosophy and religion, and try to keep always growing in that part of my life, because without having a spiritual grounding, I think you can get really swayed by the winds of all the praise or the criticism; it's all very, kind of, up and down. Try to stay up and focused. — Kimbra
Evolution has primarily been an attack on religion by militant atheists who wrap themselves in the mantle of science in an effort to refute all religious claims concerning a creator - an effort that has also often attempted to suppress all scientific criticisms of Darwin's work. — Rodney Stark
Critics say the OWS protesters hate the rich. Come on! Success is the national religion, and almost everyone is a believer. Americans love winners. But that's just the problem. These guys on Wall Street are not winning - they're cheating. And as much as we love the self-made success story, we hate the cheater that much more. — Matt Taibbi
In religious matters it is now fashionable to define tolerance as the absence of criticism of any standard religion. All too often, this absence of criticism degenerates into a conspicuous absence of thought. — Paul Blanshard
We must never forget that both good and evil flow from the Bible. It is therefore not above criticism. — Steve Allen
I'm not criticizing how people experience what they might call spirituality. I am interested in looking critically at something else - at how people use their language to articulate theories about something they call religion, to say, for example, that "in Islam religion and politics necessarily go together," or to insist that "violence has no place in religion," to universalize it. — Talal Asad
I do not criticize religion as such, but I criticize the concept and the definition of "religion" - as I said in Genealogies. — Talal Asad
The way of presentation is different according to each religion. In theistic religions like Buddhism, Buddhist values are incorporated. In nontheistic religions, like some types of ancient Indian thought, the law of karma applies. If you do something good, you get a good result. Now, what we need is a way to educate nonbelievers. These nonbelievers may be critical of all religions, but they should be decent at heart. — Dalai Lama
[There is a] depth and urgency of the search of Jewish and Christian women for connection to the Divine, which found expression in more than 1000 years of feminist Bible criticism and religious re-visioning. — Gerda Lerner
... actresses require protection in their art from blind abuse, from savage criticism. Their work is their religion, if they are seeking the best in their art, and to abuse that faith is to rob them, to dishonor them. — Nance O'Neil
The very aspect of religions that many of their critics most fear - that the religiously devout, in the name of their faith, take positions that differ from approved state policy - is one of their strengths. — Stephen L. Carter
In Conclusion
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