Ian Mcewan Quotes

It's simply untrue that religion provides the only framework for a universal morality.

If God is incomprehensible to man, it would seem rational never to think of Him at all …. whether there exists a God or not ... men's moral duties will always be the same so long as they possess their own nature

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.

Christian ethics are seldom found save in the philosophy of some unbeliever.

Morality is more than possible without God, it is entirely independent of him.

Religion gets its morality from us. We don't get our morality from religion.

Behaving morally because of a hope of reward or a fear of punishment is not morality. Morality is not bribery or threats. Religion is bribery and threats. Humans have morality. We don't need religion.

I never outgrew my conversion to atheism at 13, but at various times was a serious cultural Jew.

Personally, I think it is possible to build a society that is moral on a nonreligious basis, but the jury is still out on that.

A man who has no assured and ever present belief in the existence of a personal God or of a future existence with retribution and reward, can have for his rule of life, as far as I can see, only to follow those impulses and instincts which are the strongest or which seem to him the best ones

There's a lot of pride involved in my refusal to believe in god.

It is much to be lamented that a man of Franklin's general good character and great influence should have been an unbeliever in Christianity, and also have done as much as he did to make others unbelievers.

As an atheist, I believe that all life is unspeakably precious, because it’s only here for a brief moment, a flare against the dark, and then it’s gone forever.

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

The most important advance that the West has yet made is to develop a secularist moral tradition

The only position that leaves me with no cognitive dissonance is atheism.

Once you assume a creator and a plan, it makes us objects in a cruel experiment whereby we are created sick and commanded to be well.

Being an atheist makes someone a clearer thinking, fairer person. They [atheists] are not doing things to be rewarded in heaven; they're doing things because they're right, because they live by a moral code.

The only way to show a true respect for God is to act morally while ignoring God’s existence.

We don’t need any sort of religious orientation to lead a life that is ethical, compassionate & kind.

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

To not believe in God is to know that it falls to us to make the world a better place.

Practical atheism, seeing no guidance for human affairs but its own limited foresight, endeavors itself to play the god, and decide what will be good for mankind and what bad.

The moral absolutes rest upon God's character. The moral commands He has given to men are an expression of His character. Men as created in His image are to live by choice on the basis of what God is. The standards of morality are determined by what conforms to His character, while those things which do not conform are immoral.