Yquotes.com

 

"Imagine you are God. You’re all-powerful, nothing is beyond you. You’re all-loving. So it is really, really important to you that humans are left in no doubt about your existence and your loving nature, and exactly what they need to do in order to get to heaven and avoid eternity in the fires of hell. It’s really important to you to get that across. So what do you do? Well, if you’re Jehovah, apparently this is what you do. You talk in riddles. You tell stories which on the surface have a different message from the one you apparently want us to understand. You expect us to hear X, and instinctively understand that it needs to be interpreted in the light of Y, which you happen to have said in the course of a completely different story 500-1,000 years earlier. Instead of speaking directly into our heads - which God has presumed the capability of doing so - simply, clearly and straightforwardly in terms which the particular individual being addressed will immediately understand and respond to positively - you steep your messages in symbols, in metaphors. In fact, you choose to convey the most important message in the history of creation in code, as if you aspired to be Umberto Eco or Dan Brown. Anyone would think your top priority was to keep generation after generation after generation of theologians in meaningless employment, rather than communicate an urgent life-or-death message to the creatures you love more than any other."
--
FFRF 2012 National Convention, 12/10/2012

 

Richard Dawkins

» Richard Dawkins - all quotes »

Similar quotes

 

"The cross is a very powerful symbol and it symbolizes suffering, but it also is connected to a person who was loving and sharing and his message was about unconditional love. I tried to take a powerful image and use it to draw attention to a situation that needs attention. For me, we all need to be Jesus in our time. Jesus' message was to love your neighbor as yourself and these are people in need." Explaining the controversial crucifixion scene in her Confessions tour

 

Madonna

 

"The cross is a very powerful symbol and it symbolizes suffering, but it also is connected to a person who was loving and sharing and his message was about unconditional love. I tried to take a powerful image and use it to draw attention to a situation that needs attention. For me, we all need to be Jesus in our time. Jesus' message was to love your neighbor as yourself and these are people in need." Explaining the controversial crucifixion scene in her Confessions tour

 

Madonna Ciccone

 

Unfortunately, human nature being what it is, the moment the Church was established it became a political organisation, which meant that the consolidation of power and influence quickly became much more important than the message - message? What message? Oh, that message. Of course, yes - and inevitably, this led to bickering about status, and who got to wear the big ring and the fancy hat - you know, the really important stuff - until before long, rival popes were facing each other with massed armies on the battlefield - in the name of Christ, naturally. Even at this point, if Jesus had come back, he would have said: "What are you people doing? I haven't been gone for five minutes and already you're hacking each other to pieces like a bunch of savages! You've missed the point so completely" he'd say, wouldn't he? "You're so far wide of the mark it's way beyond embarrassing" he'd say, "I feel as if I'm talking to chimpanzees" he'd say. No offence, by the way, to any chimps who may be watching. And this is early days, don't forget. Jesus wouldn't yet know anything about all the other horrors that were about to be enacted in his name in the coming years. The Crusades, the Inquisition. He wouldn't know about the systematic suppression of knowledge and free thought that would characterise his church for the next two thousand years. He wouldn't know about the conquest of the New World, where the sacred cross of Jesus slashed and burned its way through entire populations in a way that modern jihadis can only dream about, imposing itself with unparalleled cruelty on civilisations half a world away that, even today, still don't quite know what hit them.

 

Pat Condell

 

I think that, uh, you know, I'm really happy that the message, or at least some of the message of The Secret is reaching mass consciousness in a way that people realize that they can begin to, uh, positively affect their lives. That's why when I was on the show and said "I've lived this way my whole life", and people who watched our show for years know that I've been talking about how you take responsibility for your life and the choices that you make. Empower your life. And so, when I say that, you know, um, that's how I live my life, the message of The Secret, that's what I mean. I also believe, that, uh, medical healing or healing comes in lots of forms. You know that adage about the guy being lost and God sent him a boat and God sent him— then he gets to heaven and says "Why didn't you help me?" And God's, "I sent you the boat, fool!" So, that's the way I look at medical healing.

 

Oprah Winfrey

 

You'd have to be a total idiot to say, 'I'm the slacker-generation guy. This is my generation.' I'd be laughed out of the room in an instant. I didn't even connect ['Loser'] at all to that kind of message until they were playing it on the radio and I heard it, and they said "This is the slacker anthem," and I thought, 'Oh shit, that sucks.' It's not some anguished transcendental 'cry of a generation.' It's just sitting in someone's living room eating pizza and Doritos.

 

Beck