Religious Fanaticism Quotes

The lust of conquest, when associated with religious fanaticism, has been the greatest scourge of the human race. ~ William Deans

Friendship is so much healthier than other crutches -alcohol or TV or religious fanaticism. One healthy crutch shouldn't be against the rules. ~ Tim Sandlin

What chiefly concerns and alarms many of us are the problems arising from religious fanaticism. As long as large numbers of militant enthusiasts are persuaded that they alone have access to the truth, and that the rest of us are infidels, we remain under threat. Lord Acton's famous phrase about power can be used of another danger. Dogma tends to corrupt, and absolute dogma corrupts absolutely. ~ Anthony Storr

In my midteens I went through a brief stage of religious fanaticism, but it was very much about just saying prayers and stuff like that, reciting rosaries and spending a lot of time on that kind of Catholic ritual. ~ Robert Crumb

But I think that there are things about the United States that aren't really recognized sufficiently, so it's important to remember that until 1945, the United States was a cultural backwater. It wasn't part of the modern world.... So, a good part of the country is still [adhering to] what's been traditional. It's just not part of the modern world. Just take a look at the statistics. The religious fanaticism, there's just nothing like it in the world. I mean, one of the problems with getting people interested in global warming is that about 40 percent of the population thinks that Jesus is coming in 2050, so who cares, you know. ~ Noam Chomsky

Although the far territory of the extreme can exert an intoxicating pull on susceptible individuals of all bents, extremism seems to be especially prevalent among those inclined by temperament or upbringing toward religious pursuits. Faith is the very antithesis of reason, injudiciousness a crucial component of spiritual devotion. And when religious fanaticism supplants ratiocination, all bets are suddenly off. ~ Jon Krakauer

Religious fanaticism and hatred are a world-devouring fire, whose violence none can quench. ~ Bahaullah

Tolerance and freedom of thought are the veritable antidotes to religious fanaticism. ~ Baron D'Holbach

Religious fanaticism is simply good politics in the middle-eastern countries. ~ James Aldridge

The moment you pick up a weapon in the name of a religion is the precise moment that your god ceases to exist. ~ R.Patient

Recalling some of the most spectacular horrors of history
the burning of heretics and witches at the stake, the wholesale massacre of "heathens," and other no less repulsive manifestations of Christian civilization in Europe and elsewhere
modern man is filled with pride in the "progress" accomplished, in one line at least, since the end of the dark ages of religious fanaticism. ~ Savitri Devi

The distinction between reality and fiction in America seems like it is becoming really blurry. With its religious fanaticism, reality TV programs and fake news broadcasts being aired by the government, the States feel like they are entering the Dark Ages. ~ Dana Schutz

Religious fanaticism has clearly produced, and in all probability will continue to produce, enormous amounts of bickering, fighting, violence, bloodshed, homicide, feuds, wars, and genocide. ~ Albert Ellis

That Solidarity was a religious movement no one, least of all the Soviets, can deny. In November 1981, Pravda denounced 'religious fanaticism' as a grave challenge to socialism; failure to contain it, Pravda said, was at the root of the problems in Poland. ~ Charles Colson

I want to defend Ben Bella just as I am going to defend Boumedienne. Ben Bella was not the 'demon' that the nervous, demagogic communique of 19 June accused him of being, no more than Boumedienne is the 'reactionary' that L'Unita wrote about. Both are victims of the same drama that every Third World politician lives through if he is honest, if he is a patriot. This was the drama of Lumumba and Nehru; it is the drama of Nyerere and Sekou Toure. The essence of the drama lies in the terrible material resistance that each one encounters on taking his first, second, and third steps up the summit of power. Each one wants to do something good and begins to do it and then sees, after a month, after a year, after three years, that it just isn't happening, that it is slipping away, that it is bogged down in the sand. Everything is in the way: the centuries of backwardness, the primitive economy, the illiteracy, the religious fanaticism, the tribal blindness, the chronic hunger, the colonial past with its practice of debasing and dulling the conquered, the blackmail by the imperialists, the greed of the corrupt, the unemployment, the red ink. progress comes with great difficulty along such a road. The politician begins to push too hard. He looks for a way out through dictatorship. The dictatorship then fathers an opposition. The opposition organises a coup.

And the cycle begins anew. ~ Ryszard Kapuscinski

The religious right is one of the most politically militant voting blocs in the country and the agenda is clear (a gun in every uterus). Time we stopped subsidizing the anti-abortion movement in the form of tax-exemptions. ~ Quentin R. Bufogle

I don't think the 9/11 attacks taught us anything we didn't already know about religion. It has long been obvious - even to the deeply religious - that religious fanaticism is an extremely dangerous deranger of otherwise sane and goodhearted people. ~ Daniel Dennett

Seven hundred thousand men are said to have perished in the first two expeditions, which had been thus commenced and carried on by the pious zeal of the Christian church, and in the total amount, several million were found numbered with the dead: the awful effects of religious fanaticism presuming upon the aid of heaven. ~ Elihu Palmer

The Muslim world is threatened by religious fanaticism. The Western world is threatened by secular fanaticism. ~ Dennis Prager

Hindustan had become free. Pakistan had become independent soon after its inception but man was still slave in both these countries
slave of prejudice ... slave of religious fanaticism ... slave of barbarity and inhumanity. ~ Saadat Hasan Manto

As for the second notion, the idea that we could lose our freedom by succumbing to a wave of religious hysteria, I am sorry to say that I consider it possible. I hope that it is not probable. But there is a latent deep strain of religious fanaticism in this our culture; it is rooted in our history ~ Robert A. Heinlein

Religious fanaticism is the most dangerous form of insanity. ~ Robert Graves

my advice is;
Let's join the caravan of humanity, and ally ourselves with a conscious progress, let's join the secular non-sectarian societies, lets distant ourselves from military tradition, and join the human race in benefiting humanity as a whole, let's heal our environment, and adapt social justices, that will empower the poor and the oppressed to gain his or her fundamental human rights, let's find mercy and compassion in our souls without reference to any religious fanaticism or national extremism…if we could do that, only then we can begin the return journey back to civilization…. ~ Husam Wafaei

Education is fundamentally religious. Consequently, there is no question about whether a morality will be imposed in that education, but rather which morality will be imposed. ~ Douglas Wilson

Dare to Stand Alone ~ Thomas S. Monson

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? ~ H. P. Blavatsky

The Law saith, Where is thy righteousness, goodness, and satisfaction? The Gospel saith, Christ is thy righteousness, goodness, and satisfaction. ~ Patrick Hamilton

The problem is that once the untrained mind has made a formal commitment to a religious philosophy - and it does not matter whether that philosophy is generally reasonable and high-minded or utterly bizarre and irrational ~ Steve Allen

Those who embrace the paradigm of religious superiority have an unshakable faith that they are favored by the one true god of the one true religion. They ~ Jay Snelson

Jefferson's views on religious liberty, however, appealed to many more moderate voters. New Jersey Republicans charged that Jefferson's enemies used religion as a means of assault "because he is not a fanatic, nor willing that the Quaker, the Baptist, the Methodist, or any other denominations of Christians, should pay the pastors of other sects; because he does not think that a Catholic should be banished for believing in transubstantiation, or a Jew, for believing in the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob."14 Still, ~ Jon Meacham

Giving thanks to God for both His temporal and spiritual blessings in our lives is not just a nice thing to do - it is the moral will of God. Failure to give Him the thanks due Him is sin. ~ Jerry Bridges

Men do not fear a powerful hostile army as the powers of hell fear the name and protection of Mary. ~ Bonaventure

In a perfect world, Joshua's vertically gifted murderer would've had himself a monologue before rampaging, during which he loudly and clearly would've announced his full name, occupation, religious preference, preferably with his god's country and time period of origin, his goals, dreams, and aspirations, and the location of his lair. But nobody had ever accused post-Shift Atlanta of being perfect. ~ Ilona Andrews

Whenever people have used religious documents to make accurate predictions about our base knowledge of the physical world, they have been famously wrong. ~ Neil DeGrasse Tyson

It is a great adventure to contemplate the universe, beyond man, to contemplate what it would be like without man, as it was in a great part of its long history and as it is in a great majority of places. When this objective view is finally attained, and the mystery and majesty of matter are fully appreciated, to then turn the objective eye back on man viewed as matter, to view life as part of this universal mystery of greatest depth, is to sense an experience which is very rare, and very exciting. It usually ends in laughter and a delight in the futility of trying to understand what this atom in the universe is, this thing - atoms with curiosity - that looks at itself and wonders why it wonders. Well, these scientific views end in awe and mystery, lost at the edge in uncertainty, but they appear to be so deep and so impressive that the theory that it is all arranged as a stage for God to watch man's struggle for good and evil seems inadequate.

Some will tell me that I have just described a religious experience. Very well, you may call it what you will. Then, in that language I would say that the young man's religious experience is of such a kind that he finds the religion of his church inadequate to describe, to encompass that kind of experience. The God of the church isn't big enough. ~ Richard P. Feynman

Are we to have a censor whose imprimatur shall say what books may be sold, and what we may buy? And who is thus to dogmatize religious opinions for our citizens? Whose foot is to be the measure to which ours are all to be cut or stretched? Is a priest to be our inquisitor, or shall a layman, simple as ourselves, set up his reason as the rule of what we are to read, and what we must believe? ~ Thomas Jefferson

If being tolerant of differing opinions, if believing that America has to make it as a pluralistic nation, if being civil, if that makes you a liberal, I plead guilty. ~ Bill Moyers

In the presence of Esch, values have hidden their faces. Order, loyalty, sacrifice - he cherishes all these words, but exactly what do they represent? Sacrifice for what? Demand what sort of order? He doesn't know.

If a value has lost its concrete content, what is left of it? A mere empty form; an imperative that goes unheeded and, all the more furious, demands to be heard and obeyed. The less Esch knows what he wants, the more furiously he wants it.

Esch: the fanaticism of the era with no God. Because all values have hidden their faces, anything can be considered a value. Justice, order - Esch seeks them now in the trade union struggle, then in religion; today in police power, tomorrow in the mirage of America, where he dreams of emigrating. He could be a terrorist or a repentant terrorist turning in his comrades, or a party militant or a cult member a kamikaze prepared to sacrifice his life. All the passions rampaging through the bloody history of our time are taken up, unmasked, and terrifyingly displayed in Esch's modest adventure. ~ Milan Kundera

My question to the atheist is, do you want an atheist world or a peaceful world? And to the believer, do you want a religious world or a peaceful world? Religious orientation doesn't define peace, but the answer here may define one's true nature. ~ Abhijit Naskar

Meditation essentially means having a great time. Some people have applied a sense or a feeling to the meditative experience, such that, meditation has become a quantifiable religious experience, which means it's not any fun! ~ Frederick Lenz

We've got no fairytale ending, in God's hands our fate is complete. Your heaven's here in my heart, our love's this dust beneath my feet. ~ Bruce Springsteen

Social cohesion was built into language long before Facebook and LinkedIn and Twitter - we're tribal by nature. Tribes today aren't the same as tribes thousand of years ago: It isn't just religious tribes or ethnic tribes now: It's sports fans, it's communities, it's geography. ~ Peter Guber

Both the mentally healthy and the neurotic are driven by the need to find an answer [to the problem of human existence], the only difference being that one answer corresponds more to the total needs of man, and hence is more conducive to the unfolding of his powers and to his happiness than the other. All cultures provide for a patterned system in which certain solutions are predominant, hence certain strivings and satisfactions ... The deviate from the cultural pattern is just as much in search of an answer as his more well-adjusted brother. His answer may be better or worse than the one given by his culture - it is always another answer to the same fundamental question raised by human existence. In this sense all cultures are religious and every neurosis is a private form of religion, provided we mean by religion an attempt to answer the problem of human existence. ~ Erich Fromm

He quickly responded, "A person with a religious spirit is one who uses My Word to execute his own will!" In other words, it is when we take what the Lord has said and work our own desires into it. ~ John Bevere

Life begets life by its very nature. By the same token, inspired men inspire. ~ Leonard Ravenhill

Organized religion is a sham and a crutch for weak-minded people who need strength in numbers. It tells people to go out and stick their noses in other people's business. I live by the golden rule: Treat others as you'd want them to treat you. The religious right wants to tell people how to live. ~ Jesse Ventura

The purely emotional form of Pietism is, as Ritschl has pointed out, a religious dilettantism for the leisure class. ~ Max Weber

Therefore it is unnecessary for a prince to have all the good qualities I have enumerated, but it is very necessary to appear to have them. And I shall dare to say this also, that to have them and always to observe them is injurious, and that to appear to have them is useful; to appear merciful, faithful, humane, religious, upright, and to be so, but with a mind so framed that should you require not to be so, you may be able and know how to change to the opposite. ~ Niccolo Machiavelli

Mohammed took his tribal customs and traditions and injected them into his new religion. Many of the ideas and traditions he implemented were already contained in the tribes he conquered, so in many cases, no major changes were required of his new followers. For example, most, if not all, of the tribes were polygamous. Women were seen primarily as chattel and under the complete control of their fathers or husbands. The communities of the new Islamic religion in the 600s CE often converted en masse. With minor modifications, they kept practicing their traditions. Mecca was already a major pagan religious shrine; Mohammed conveniently changed it into a place of worship and pilgrimage for Allah.
Practically speaking, Mohammed unified a fracture region under a single religion and did it with a superior military. Conquest, war, and male predominance were the hallmarks of Islam. Despite political splits over the centuries, the tribal nature of Islam remains intact. ~ Darrel Ray

A question for Christians who accept evolution: When did we gain a "soul"? Did Homo habilis have a soul? Homo ergaster? Did God only spontaneously add a soul when we evolved into Homo sapiens? ~ David G. McAfee

Scientific socialism, is the most religious of all religions, and the true Social Democrat is the most deeply religious of all human beings. ~ Anatoly Lunacharsky

Is it ever acceptable to be angry at God? I would suggest that it is not only acceptable, it may be one of the hallmarks of a truly religious person. It puts honesty ahead of flattery. ~ Harold S. Kushner

The First Amendment is now being used by the secularists of our day as a cattle prod to herd conservative religious people out of the public life of the nation and into, as others have put it, a religious ghetto. ~ Pat Swindall

This Civil Rights Act is a challenge to all of us to go to work in our communities and our states, in our homes and in our hearts, to eliminate the last vestiges of injustice in our beloved country. So tonight I urge every public official, every religious leader, every business and professional man, every working man, every housewife - I urge every American - to join in this effort to bring justice and hope to all our people, and to bring peace to our land. ~ Lyndon B. Johnson

It was Christians, you know, not Pagans, who were responsible for the Holocaust. It was Christians, not Pagans, who lynched people here in the South, who burned people at the stake, frequently in the name of this Jesus Christ. ~ Desmond Tutu

SACRED, adj. Dedicated to some religious purpose; having a divine character; inspiring solemn thoughts or emotions; as ... the Cow in India; the Crocodile, the Cat and the Onion of ancient Egypt. ~ Ambrose Bierce

If you spend enough time reading or writing, you find a voice, but you also find certain tastes. You find certain writers who when they write, it makes your own brain voice like a tuning fork, and you just resonate with them. And when that happens, reading those writers - not all of whom are modern ... I mean, if you are willing to make allowances for the way English has changed, you can go way, way back with this - becomes a source of unbelievable joy. It's like eating candy for the soul. So probably the smart thing to say is that lucky people develop a relationship with a certain kind of art that becomes spiritual, almost religious, and doesn't mean, you know, church stuff, but it means you're just never the same. ~ David Foster Wallace

Another way to describe the dilemma for religious faith is that pluralism creates social conditions in which God is no longer an inevitability. While it is possible to believe in God, one has to work much harder at it because the framework of belief is no longer present to sustain it. The presumption of God and of his active presence in the world cannot be easily sustained because the most important symbols of social, economic, political, and aesthetic life no longer point to him. God is simply less obvious than he once was, and for most no longer obvious at all - quite the opposite. ~ James Davison Hunter

I then greet and cordially thank you all, dear friends belonging to other religious traditions; first of all the Muslims, who worship the one God, living and merciful, and call upon Him in prayer, and all of you. I really appreciate your presence: in it I see a tangible sign of the will to grow in mutual esteem and cooperation for the common good of humanity. ~ Pope Francis

We abide in God insofar as we do not sin. ~ Venerable Bede

When everyone drowns and I'm the only one to escape, God is protecting me. When everyone else is saved and I'm the only one to drown, God is protecting me then too. ~ Nikos Kazantzakis

When, in 2012, Newt Gingrich was asked about how his religious beliefs would affect his conduct should he become president, the Republican nominee hopeful answered, "One of the reasons I am running is there has been an increasingly aggressive war against religion and in particular against Christianity" in the United States. For a potential president to state that he sees himself as a wartime candidate who will defend his party against other citizens is astonishing. There is not even a pretense here of "united states". ~ Candida R. Moss

Cruelty to animals is as if humans did not love God. ~ John Henry Newman

in 3000 b.c....in spain, france, the british isles and old europe, the lives of people centered on nature and motherhood. they honored mother nature, mother earth and mother creator. women were revered as the givers of life. as creators, they were thought to be connected to diety. statues of the goddesses of these early people were of full-breasted women with bodies clearly depicting the ballooning abdomen of women about to give birth. these primal people regarded birthing as the highest manifestation of nature. when a woman gave birth, everyone gathered around her in the temple for the "celebration of life." birthing was a religious rite, and not at all the painful ordeal it came to be years later. ~ Marie F. Mongan