Atheist QOTD

“Europeans may take a sceptical view of political leaders who are too quick to express religious faith in public, yet churches have a greater influence on politics than many people realise.”

Sophie in 't Veld

“Christians have put up with a theory of salvation that has at its core the idea that God requires the sacrifice of his own son so that human sin can be cancelled. 'There was no other good enough to pay the price of sin,' we will all sing. The fact this is a disgusting idea, and morally degenerate, is obvious to all but those indoctrinated into a very narrow reading of the cross.”

Giles Fraser

“The church has always been late. We were late on slavery. We were late on civil rights. And now we're late on this [the acceptance of gays].”

Jay Bakker

“One hypothesis for the origin of religion is that it's a kind of 'costly signaling' – a way for people to prove their loyalty to the group by participating in complex rituals and extravagant shows of devotion. But there's an under-appreciated danger to this: when everyone in a community already follows a strict interpretation of faith, religious belief will have a tendency to spiral out of control into extremism, as group members go to greater and greater lengths to express their piety.”

Adam Lee

“It's almost certain that some religious believers will be bothered by even the mildest of statements from non-believers, but that's a risk atheists have to be willing to take. Where believers are simply 'sharing' the 'good news', atheists are [allegedly] 'forcing' their atheism on others, or being 'rude' and 'disrespectful.'”

Austin Cline