Christopher Hitchens Quotes

Morality must always precede and accompany religion, and yet religion is much more than morality.

Religion is ethics heightened, enkindled, lit up by feeling

I'm very passionate about philosophy and religion.

I do not value religion chiefly for its morality.

Science attempts to analyze how things and people and animals behave; it has no concern whether this behavior is good or bad, is purposeful or not. But religion is precisely the quest for such answers: whether an act is right or wrong, good or bad, and why.

There is nothing specific we have to believe in order to have moral and spiritual lives.

Religions are, for the most part, bad. But religion is not.

Politics moves upward into ethics, and ethics ascends to theology.

I even agree that the concept of god helps some people lead better lives. That does happen. Don't ever forget it. I just think there are better ways to help people lead better lives.

Morality is always derivative. It stems from one's worldview.

Applying good sense to religion and religion to life. This is the field in which I design to labor

One of the great tragedies of mankind is that morality has been hijacked by religion.

Philosophy has no end in view save truth; faith looks for nothing but obedience and piety.

Morality may exist in an atheist without any religion, and in a theist with a religion quite unspiritual.

Let us with Caution indulge the supposition that morality can be maintained without religion.

There is no true and abiding morality that is not founded in religion.

At the core of every moral code there is a picture of human nature, a map of the universe, and a version of history. To human nature (of the sort conceived), in a universe (of the kind imagined), after a history (so understood), the rules of the code apply.

Irrespective of whether we are believers or agnostics, whether we believe in God or karma, moral ethics is a code which everyone is able to pursue.

Religion is one of the most important forces in the world. Whether you are a Christian, a Muslim, a Buddhist, a Jew, or a Hindu, religion is a great force, and it can help one have command of one's own morality, one's own behavior, and one's own attitude.

It's important though to distinguish between religion and spirituality.

Human decency is not derived from religion. It precedes it.

Morality without religion is only a kind of dead reckoning - an endeavor to find our place on a cloudy sea by measuring the distance we have run, but without any observation of the heavenly bodies.

When men can no longer be theists, they must, if they are civilized, become humanists.

The very idea that we get a moral compass from religion is horrible. Not only should we not get our moral compass from religion, as a matter of fact we don't.

Any simple claim that you need religion to be good is flat wrong.