Desmond Tutu Quotes

Religion cannot and should not be understood by their texts alone. The lived history of a community of believers defines a religion; a great deal depends on how the custodians of the faith chose to interpret, defend and exploit or abuse its sacred texts.

People are able to justify immense cruelty and say that it is something that is sanctioned by their faith.

You can find justification for slavery in the Bible. Some say this is what the Bible says and that closes the argument.

Religion is like a knife: you can either use it to cut bread, or stick in someone's back.

Jesus never said anything about homosexuality.

In vain, without the Bible, we increase penal laws and draw entrenchments around our institutions.

Without God, democracy will not and cannot long endure.

If you replace the word God in the Bible with the word Truth, it reads exactly right.

Men, in a word, must necessarily be controlled, either by a power within them, or by a power without them; either by the word of God, or by the strong arm of man; either by the Bible, or by the bayonet.

Religion to me really means ethical systems.

The increasing influence of the Bible is marvelously great, penetrating everywhere. It carries with it a tremendous power of freedom and justice guided by a combined force of wisdom and goodness.

The goal for me is to stand up for the word of God which is so important to me. It means more to me than what I have.

Largely, the people driving abolition did it because of what they believed from the Bible.

I don't want to justify religion in terms of its benefits to us. I believe that, on balance, it does a lot of bad things, too - a tremendous amount. But I don't think that the final justification of religion is the good it does for people. I think the final justification is that it's true, and truth takes priority over consequences. Religion helps us deal with what is most important to the human spirit: values, meaning, purpose, and quality.

The devils more orthodox than some theologians I know.

We must believe in the gods no longer if injustice is to prevail over justice.

Having been unable to strengthen justice, we have justified strength.

I'm strongly into the Bible; I'm strongly into God and religion.I'm pro-life and different things.

The Bible tells us to be like God, and then on page after page it describes God as a mass murderer. This may be the single most important key to the political behavior of Western Civilization.

We've had to deal with so many complications. We're still dealing with them. And what can we do? Nothing - well, unless we take your side's point of view and make deals with the devil. But why? Why can't we make deals with God? People do all the time. 'God, if you do this for me, I promise to be good.' Stuff like that. Yeah, but I don't see any contracts like you guys have. No hard evidence that it works. How come we can only get things we want by being bad? Why can't we get them by being good?

Some people have religion as a means of solace. But, I had a dreidel, so that was out.

Religion is, by definition, interpretation; and by definition, all interpretations are valid. However, some interpretations are more reasonable than others.

Belief must be something different from a mixture of opinions about God and the world, and of precepts for one life or for two. Piety cannot be an instinct craving for a mess of metaphysical and ethical crumbs.

What's up is faith, what's down is heresy.

It was Christianity which first painted the devil on the worlds walls; It was Christianity which first brought sin into the world. Belief in the cure which it offered has now been shaken to it's deepest roots; but belief in the sickness which it taught and propagated continues to exists.