Borrowing heavily from a collection by Ronald B. Shwartz, here is my personal collection of quotes about God.
The God I believe in is not so fragile that you hurt Him by being angry at Him, or so petty that He will hold it against you from being upset with Him.
-Rabbi Harold S. Kushner
Although I can't reccomend staying in that state for long. It does something to your soul.
It's an interesting view of atheism, as a sort of crutch for those who can't stand the reality of God.
-Tom Stoppard
I wonder if an atheist would take as much offense to this statement as a believer does when it's directed at him? I wouldn't go around saying such things; I don't think it befits my faith to offend so deliberately. But it's an interesting perspective, none the less.
A God who let us prove his existence would be an idol.
-Dietrich Bonhoffer, No Rusty Swords, 1965
That God has managed to survive the inanities of the religions that do Him honor is truly miraculous proof of His existence.
-Ben Hecht
Sometimes I think we're alone. Sometimes I think we're not. In either case, the thought is quite staggering.
-R. Buckminster Fuller, quoted in Omni, April 1980
Experience has repeatedly confirmed that well-known maxim of [Francis] Bacon's that "a little philosophy inclineth a man's mind to atheism, but depth in philosophy bringeth men's minds about to religion." At the same time, when Bacon penned that sage epigram ...... he forgot to add that the God to whom depth in philosophy brings back men's minds is far from being the same from whom a little philosophy estranges them.
-George Santayana
The believer in God must explain one thing, the existence of suffering; the non-believer, however, must explain the existence of everything else.
-Dennis Prager and Joseph Telushkin, The Nine Questions People Ask About Judaim, 1981
I think it pisses God off if you walk by the color purple in a field somewhere and don't take notice.
-Alice Walker, The Color Purple, 1982
A baby is God's opinion that world should go on.
-Carl Sandburg, quoted in the Kansas City Star, Feb. 20, 1977
Similarly.....
Every child comes with the message that God is not yet discouraged of man.
-Rabindranath Tagore
If only God would give me some clear sign! Like making a large deposit in my name at a Swiss bank.
-Woody Allen
God loves you and I'm trying.
-Bumper Sticker
We use religion like a trolley-car -we ride on it only when it is going our way.
-Source Unknown
Religion isn't yours firsthand until you doubt it right down to the ground.
-Francis B. Sayre, Dean, National Cathedral, Washington, D.C., quoted in Life, April 2, 1965
The church is a whore, but she's our mother.
-Daniel and Philip Berrigan
God knew from all eternity that I was going to be Pope. You thing he would have made me more photogenic.
-Pope John XXIII
A priest friend of mine has cautioned me away from the standard God of our childhoods, who loves you and guides you and then, if you are bad, roasts you: God as high school principal in a gray suit who never remembered your name but is always leafing unhappily through your files. If this is your God, maybe you need to blend in the influence of someone who is ever so slightly more amused by you, someone less anal. Mr. Rogers will work.
-Anne Lamott
I find this quote very ironic, since when I was little, I thought Mr. Rogers was God. I thought the 23-1/2 hours he wasn't on TV, he was running the universe. I would never watch anytime but him, and I watched him religiously. And the priest is right, it is a rather healthy view of God, that he would take out a half an hour a day to explain how the postal system works or play with puppets or feed the fish or sing to a little kid (who sang right back at the TV).
I do not feel obligated to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended for us to forgo their use.
-Galileo Galilei
How important the concept of God is, and how instead of valuing what it has given us, we with light hearts spurn it because of absurdities that have been attached to it.
Leo Tolstoy, Last Diaries, 1960
I find it interesting that the meanest life, the poorest esistence, is attributed to God's will, but as humans beings become more affluent, as their living standard and style begin to ascend the material scale, God desends the scale of responsibility at a commensurate speed.
-Maya Angelou, I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings, 1969
Preah it, Maya.
When you knock, ask to see God - none of the servants.
-Henry David Thoreau
I have always believed in God, though I have my quarrels with Him. In the Jewish tradition, one may say no to God if it is on behalf of other people.
-Elie Wiesel
But before we take on the privileges of the prophets, lets think twice about the responsibilities they had.
Those who never rebelled against God or at some point in their lives shaken their fists in the face of heaven, have never encountered God at all.
-Catherine Marshall, Christy, 1967
He who created us without our help will not save us without our consent.
-Saint Augustine
It is good enough to talk of God while we are sitting here after a nice breakfast and looking forward to a nicer luncheon, but how am I to talk of God to the millions who have to go without two meals a day? To them God can only appear as bread and butter.
-Mahatma Gandhi
His understanding of some things absolutely blows my mind.
If Jesus were to come today, people would not even crucify him. They would ask him to dinner, and hear what he had to say, and make fun of him.
-Thomas Carlyle
I don't know how God managed it. I'm having a terrible time.
-John Huston, film producer, while making The Bible
And in the catagory of people that, in my humble opinion, God shivers when they affiliate themselves with Him..............
I can't understand how all this can happen. It's enough to make one lose one's faith in God!
-Eva Braun, writing to a friend from Hitler's bunker during the seige and bombing of Berlin in April 1945.
Herein we see God's great mercy.... for the slaughter was in all 5,517, but ten of the enemy's side were slain to one of ours.
-Nehemiah Wallington
The God I believe in is not so fragile that you hurt Him by being angry at Him, or so petty that He will hold it against you from being upset with Him.
-Rabbi Harold S. Kushner
Although I can't reccomend staying in that state for long. It does something to your soul.
It's an interesting view of atheism, as a sort of crutch for those who can't stand the reality of God.
-Tom Stoppard
I wonder if an atheist would take as much offense to this statement as a believer does when it's directed at him? I wouldn't go around saying such things; I don't think it befits my faith to offend so deliberately. But it's an interesting perspective, none the less.
A God who let us prove his existence would be an idol.
-Dietrich Bonhoffer, No Rusty Swords, 1965
That God has managed to survive the inanities of the religions that do Him honor is truly miraculous proof of His existence.
-Ben Hecht
Sometimes I think we're alone. Sometimes I think we're not. In either case, the thought is quite staggering.
-R. Buckminster Fuller, quoted in Omni, April 1980
Experience has repeatedly confirmed that well-known maxim of [Francis] Bacon's that "a little philosophy inclineth a man's mind to atheism, but depth in philosophy bringeth men's minds about to religion." At the same time, when Bacon penned that sage epigram ...... he forgot to add that the God to whom depth in philosophy brings back men's minds is far from being the same from whom a little philosophy estranges them.
-George Santayana
The believer in God must explain one thing, the existence of suffering; the non-believer, however, must explain the existence of everything else.
-Dennis Prager and Joseph Telushkin, The Nine Questions People Ask About Judaim, 1981
I think it pisses God off if you walk by the color purple in a field somewhere and don't take notice.
-Alice Walker, The Color Purple, 1982
A baby is God's opinion that world should go on.
-Carl Sandburg, quoted in the Kansas City Star, Feb. 20, 1977
Similarly.....
Every child comes with the message that God is not yet discouraged of man.
-Rabindranath Tagore
If only God would give me some clear sign! Like making a large deposit in my name at a Swiss bank.
-Woody Allen
God loves you and I'm trying.
-Bumper Sticker
We use religion like a trolley-car -we ride on it only when it is going our way.
-Source Unknown
Religion isn't yours firsthand until you doubt it right down to the ground.
-Francis B. Sayre, Dean, National Cathedral, Washington, D.C., quoted in Life, April 2, 1965
The church is a whore, but she's our mother.
-Daniel and Philip Berrigan
God knew from all eternity that I was going to be Pope. You thing he would have made me more photogenic.
-Pope John XXIII
A priest friend of mine has cautioned me away from the standard God of our childhoods, who loves you and guides you and then, if you are bad, roasts you: God as high school principal in a gray suit who never remembered your name but is always leafing unhappily through your files. If this is your God, maybe you need to blend in the influence of someone who is ever so slightly more amused by you, someone less anal. Mr. Rogers will work.
-Anne Lamott
I find this quote very ironic, since when I was little, I thought Mr. Rogers was God. I thought the 23-1/2 hours he wasn't on TV, he was running the universe. I would never watch anytime but him, and I watched him religiously. And the priest is right, it is a rather healthy view of God, that he would take out a half an hour a day to explain how the postal system works or play with puppets or feed the fish or sing to a little kid (who sang right back at the TV).
I do not feel obligated to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended for us to forgo their use.
-Galileo Galilei
How important the concept of God is, and how instead of valuing what it has given us, we with light hearts spurn it because of absurdities that have been attached to it.
Leo Tolstoy, Last Diaries, 1960
I find it interesting that the meanest life, the poorest esistence, is attributed to God's will, but as humans beings become more affluent, as their living standard and style begin to ascend the material scale, God desends the scale of responsibility at a commensurate speed.
-Maya Angelou, I Know Why The Caged Bird Sings, 1969
Preah it, Maya.
When you knock, ask to see God - none of the servants.
-Henry David Thoreau
I have always believed in God, though I have my quarrels with Him. In the Jewish tradition, one may say no to God if it is on behalf of other people.
-Elie Wiesel
But before we take on the privileges of the prophets, lets think twice about the responsibilities they had.
Those who never rebelled against God or at some point in their lives shaken their fists in the face of heaven, have never encountered God at all.
-Catherine Marshall, Christy, 1967
He who created us without our help will not save us without our consent.
-Saint Augustine
It is good enough to talk of God while we are sitting here after a nice breakfast and looking forward to a nicer luncheon, but how am I to talk of God to the millions who have to go without two meals a day? To them God can only appear as bread and butter.
-Mahatma Gandhi
His understanding of some things absolutely blows my mind.
If Jesus were to come today, people would not even crucify him. They would ask him to dinner, and hear what he had to say, and make fun of him.
-Thomas Carlyle
I don't know how God managed it. I'm having a terrible time.
-John Huston, film producer, while making The Bible
And in the catagory of people that, in my humble opinion, God shivers when they affiliate themselves with Him..............
I can't understand how all this can happen. It's enough to make one lose one's faith in God!
-Eva Braun, writing to a friend from Hitler's bunker during the seige and bombing of Berlin in April 1945.
Herein we see God's great mercy.... for the slaughter was in all 5,517, but ten of the enemy's side were slain to one of ours.
-Nehemiah Wallington
2 Comments:
How about putting words to music?
This is a wonderful collection. Here's one of my favorites:
A Suspended Blue Ocean
The sky
Is a suspended blue ocean.
The stars are the fish
That swim.
The planets are the white whales
I sometimes hitch a ride on,
And the sun and all light
Have forever fused themselves
Into my heart and upon
My skin.
There is only one rule
On this Wild Playground,
For every sign Hafiz has ever seen
Reads the same.
They all say,
"Have fun, my dear; my dear, have fun,
In the Beloved's Divine
Game,
O, in the Beloved's
Wonderful Game."
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