W. Somerset Maugham Quotes

Religion is based on the idea that God is an imbecile.

I like Christianity. I'm a fan of Jesus and his whole philosophy but not the social teaching aspects of it, of course.

As a scientist, I can not help feeling that all religions are on a tottering foundation. None is perfect or inspired.The idea that a good God would send people to a burning hell is utterly damnable to me. I don't want to have anything to do with such a God.

Yet this is trash that the Church imposes upon the world as the Word of God; this is the collection of lies and contradictions called the Holy Bible! This is the rubbish called Revealed Religion!

To arrive at the truth in all things, we ought always to be ready to believe that what seems to us white is black if the hierarchical Church so defines it.

If there was a wire running to the Throne of Grace, he'd issue orders to Almighty God, remove Christ Jesus as a Communist and give some Massachusetts Mugwump the job.

I do not speak for my church on public matters—and the church does not speak for me.

I beg to move: That the following words be inserted after the word 'Constitution' (line 2)-- 'humbly relying on the blessing of Almighty God...

Father Coughlin has the right to express his views on current events, but he is not authorized to speak for the Catholic Church, nor does he represent the doctrine or sentiment of the Church.

We are much rejoiced upon hearing that Your Highness has come to rule Hungary at the order of Almighty God …. You excel in knowledge of church writings, unusual in the secular world and, what is even more fit for a judge’s power, in the knowledge of Holy canons.

Do not concern yourself with politics and the world; your job is to connect the hearts to God.

Religion is a sham when it claims to reveal the secret of life and death, to possess the eternal supreme truth, when it says that he who does not believe shall be damned.

There is no national security but in the nation's humble, acknowledged dependence upon God and His overruling providence.

Reason, in fact, is a thing of God, inasmuch as there is nothing which God the Maker of all has not provided, disposed, ordained by reason.

We grew up going to church, and I believe in God. I don't know that I have the ability to define what or who or how God is. You know, I think that religion kind of messes people up in that regard. That's just my own personal philosophy.

I have never doubted. I have had a firm belief in God and the church.

I simply care nothing for any of your religions, as all three are fundamentally flawed, unlike the Church of Common Sense, right from the start! They call God he instead of she and all three would like to burn me at the stake for saying that!

The Church does not invent sins but recognizes the will of God and has to declare it. Of course, the great thing.. is that upon the Church, which has to declare the will of God in its full magnitude, in its unconditional rigor, so that man should know his true measure, is bestowed as a gift, at the same time, the task of forgiving.

Before everything else, fidelity to the Church: One, Holy, Catholic, and Apostolic. Jesus did not found several churches, but one single Church.

Religious belief is without reason and without dignity, and its record is near-universally dreadful.

It is said that there is no salvation outside the Church. Who denies this? And therefore whatever things of the Church are had outside the Church do not avail unto salvation.

If anyone says that it is possible that at some time, given the advancement of knowledge, a sense may be assigned to the dogmas propounded by the Church which is different from that which the Church has understood and understands: let him be anathema.

We must put aside all judgment of our own, and keep the mind ever ready and prompt to obey in all things the true Spouse of Christ our Lord, our holy Mother, the hierarchical Church.

God is an oppressor, He is incapable of human sympathy; behind a smiling face He hides an evil heart.

The definitions of the Church are the rules of true faith.