Susan Sontag Quotes

Religious freedom certainly means the right to worship God, individually and in community, as our consciences dictate. But religious liberty, by its nature, transcends places of worship and the private sphere of individuals and families.

Nowhere have the forces of intolerance been displayed less tolerantly than in the area of religious speech and practice.

America was first colonized by Puritans. Most of our earliest immigrants, and many since, have come here in order to practice their religious beliefs as they please. Our culture has always been, and will most likely always be, profoundly influenced by religion.

I believe that nothing enjoys a higher estate in our society than the right given by the First and Fourteenth Amendments freely to practice and proclaim one's religious convictions.

What is blasphemy? Of course nobody knows what it is, unless he takes into consideration where he is. What is blasphemy in one country would be a religious exhortation in another. It is owing to where you are and who is in authority.

If you see anything, you see I post a lot of Scriptures.

[The founding fathers] believed that freedom of expression included religious views and beliefs, so long as the government did not force people to worship in a particular matter and remain neutral on what those views and beliefs were.

Religion is not something I like to talk about publicly. One reason is the politics, but also I think spirituality is deeply personal.

No person can be punished for entertaining or professing religious beliefs or disbeliefs, for church attendance or non-attendance.

The very same book, even if it is translated very accurately, let's say from Hebrew into English or from English into Hebrew, becomes a different book because language is a musical instrument.

There's a difference between freedom of worship and freedom of religion. Worship is an event that happens inside the house of worship. Religion is a lifestyle. It is a way of living.

I have spent almost my entire adult life fighting to defend the religious liberty of every American to follow his or her faith and live according to his conscience.

Religious freedom is a fundamental human right.

There are many hypotheses in physics of almost comparable brillance and elegance that have been rejected because they did not survive such a confrontation with experiment. In my view, the human condition would be greatly improved if such confrontations and willingness to reject hypotheses were a regular part of our social, political, economic, religious and cultural lives.

Every one of the numberless religions and religious sects views the Deity after its own fashion; and, fathering on the unknown its own speculations, it enforces these purely human outgrowths of overheated imagination on the ignorant masses, and calls them "revelation." As the dogmas of every religion and sect often differ radically, they cannot be true. And if untrue, what are they?

On the issues of religious liberty, the Supreme Court continues to scrape against the bedrock of the American spirit.

Freedom of religion means the right of the individual to choose and to adhere to whichever religious beliefs he may prefer, to join with others in religious associations to express these beliefs, and to incur no civil disabilities because of his choice.

Religion is like the fashion, one man wears his doublet slashed, another lashed, another plain; but every man has a doublet; so every man has a religion. We differ about the trimming.

The First Amendment isn't about free thought and free opinion and free belief. The First Amendment is about free exercise: the carrying into practice of religious principles and beliefs and convictions.

We must protect the right of citizens to practice their religions freely. As president, I will support federal and state-level legislation like the Religious Freedom Restoration Acts that protect citizens and their churches from government intrusion.

I am committed to the First Amendment principles of religious freedom, tolerance, and diversity. Whether Mormon, Methodist, Jewish, or Muslim, Americans should be able to participate in their constitutional free exercise of religion. I do not think witchcraft is a religion, and I do not think it is in any way appropriate for the U.S. military to promote it.

I don't like it, to be honest, when politicians make a big thing of their religious beliefs, so I don't make a big thing of it.

To understand my feelings — and my conception of the role of Secretary General — the nature of my religious and cultural background must first be understood. I should therefore like to outline not only my beliefs but also my conception of human institutions and of the human situation itself.

I just want to remind us all there are billions of people in the world who are deeply religious, who get enriched by the wonderful sense of community by their religion. But these same people do not embrace the extraordinary view that the Earth is somehow only 6,000 years old.

Watch out for people who call themselves religious; make sure you know what they mean - make sure they know what they mean!