Barack Obama Quotes

I hope nobody is seriously suggesting that we get our morals from scripture because if we did we'd be stoning people for working on the Sabbath or switching on a light on the Sabbath. So the point is that you can find good bits of the Bible but you have to cherry-pick, you have reject the nasty bits and pick the nice bits.

Religious moderation is the direct result of taking scripture less and less seriously. So why not take it less seriously still? Why not admit the the Bible is merely a collection of imperfect books written by highly fallible human beings.

We need to acknowledge that there is a real issue with how the Scriptures are being interpreted. Whenever I am told that terrorists are not Muslim, I systematically reply that they actually are, and they cannot be marginalised, the same way they are marginalising other Muslim people. Scriptures are quoted even though their interpretations are twisted. In the face of misinterpretation the only way out would be using another interpretation of the Scriptures.

A Warrior knows that the ends do not justify the means. Because there are no ends, there are only means.

As a rule of thumb I say, if Socrates, Jesus and Tolstoy wouldn't do it, don't.

No public man can be just a little crooked. There is no such thing as a no-man's land between honesty and dishonesty.

I've often thought that my scruples about stealing books were the only thing that stood in the way of my being a really great scholar.

I think that there are certain principles which should guide decision-making for a president. One such principle was that we're all God's children, and every life is precious. To me, that's a moral statement.

[It is] one of the most complex and emotional issues of out time.

There are very good Christians who are compassionate and caring. And there are very bad Christians. You can say that about Islam, about Hinduism, about any faith. That is why I was saying that it was not the faith per se but the adherent. People will use their religion to justify virtually anything.

If people find that controversial then I would just refer them to the Sermon on the Mount.

When somebody is flying airplanes into buildings and killing innocent people in the name of God, it makes you question why do they have that interpretation and somebody else has another interpretation, and how many people of Muslim faith would agree with that, and what are the different aspects of different people's religions that is so divisive, rather than being unifying?

The narratives of Scripture were not meant to describe our world ... but to change the world, including the one in which we now live.

Traditional Muslims stand at the foot of the ladder, living in guilt for not really practicing Islam. At the top are fundamentalists, the ones you see in the news killing women and children for the glory of the god of the Qur'an. Moderates are somewhere in between. A moderate Muslim is actually more dangerous than a fundamentalist, however, because he appears to be harmless, and you can never tell when he has taken that next step toward the top. Most suicide bombers began as moderates.

Take any country that has laws against hate crimes, inspiring hatred and genocide and so on. The first thing they would do is ban the Old Testament. There's nothing like it in the literary canon that exalts genocide, to that extent. And it's not a joke either. Like where I live, New England, the people who liberated it from the native scourge were religious fundamentalist lunatics, who came waving the holy book, declaring themselves to be the children of Israel who are killing the Amalekites, like God told them.

Only people who are assured of daily food can concern themselves with matters of principle and ethic. A man will become a slave rather than starve.

I tell you, commander, it's true that some of the most terrible things in the world are done by people who think, genuinely think, that they're doing it for the best, especially if there is some god involved.

The fear of hell, the punishment of sin, how the modern parent revolts from such teaching. Yet I will assert that far from doing us children harm, it was a sure foundation to the world of our confidence, a master girder in our palace of delight.

The holy law of Jesus Christ governs our civilisation, but it does not yet permeate it.

... no human actions ever were intended by the Maker of men to be guided by balances of expediency, but by balances of justice.

Truth and right are above utility in all realms of thought and action.

The violence in the Old Testament and New Testament is descriptive. The violence in the Koran is for all time and it is prescriptive. And Mohammed said "I have been made victorious through terror.".

What is lawful is not always identical to what is right.

We need to put people in positions of authority in government, business, law, medicine, media, sports and entertainment who are filled with the laws of God so that we can bring those laws into effect.