religious practices Quotes

“When I would complain about the kneeling, which was new to me—not to mention the abundance of litanies and recited creeds in the Episcopal service—Owen would tell me that I knew nothing. Not only did Catholics kneel and mutter litanies and creeds without ceasing, but they ritualized any hope of contact with God to such an extent that Owen felt they’d interfered with his ability to pray—to talk to God DIRECTLY, as Owen put it. And then there was confession! Here I was complaining about some simple kneeling, but what did I know about confessing my sins? Owen said the pressure to confess—as a Catholic—was so great that he’d often made things up in order to be forgiven for them.”

“Atonement was powerful; it was the lock on the door you closed against the past. ”

“I am, or try to be, a fairly religious [Catholic]. I wasn’t always. I used to just drift along […] I never considered death or the possibility of a life hereafter. And this is why I’m writing to you: because God made you as well as me and He loves you just as He loves me .”

“He did not smoke, and of course he did not drink; indeed, he had never tasted spirits, and was inclined to avoid people who had—a circumstance that did not shrink his social circle as much as might be supposed, for the center of that circle was supplied by the members of Garden City’s First Methodist Church, […] most of whom were as abstemious as Mr. Clutter could desire.”

“But that’s impossible. Can you imagine Mr. Clutter missing church? Just to sleep?”

“A belief in God and the rituals surrounding that belief—church every Sunday, grace before meals, prayers before bed—were an important part of the Deweys’ existence.”

“Isn’t religion supposed to teach tolerance?”

“To have sought a medical explanation for this phenomenon would have been held by Silas himself, as well as by his minister and fellow-members, a willful self-exclusion from the spiritual significance that might lie therein.”

“His life seemed to have drawn near to eternity; every thought, word, and deed, every instance of consciousness could be made to revibrate radiantly in heaven; and at times his sense of such immediate repercussion was so lively that he seemed to feel his soul in devotion pressing like fingers the keyboard of a great cash register and to see the amount of his purchase start forth immediately in heaven, not as a number but as a frail column of incense or as a slender flower.”

“– Then, said Cranly, you do not intend to become a protestant? – I said that I had lost the faith, Stephen answered, but not that I had lost self-respect. What kind of liberation would that be to forsake an absurdity which is logical and coherent and to embrace one which is illogical and incoherent?”

“God ... is white. ”

“If the concept of God has any validity or any use, it can only be to make us larger, freer, and more loving. If God cannot do this, then it is time we got rid of Him.”

“If God cannot do this, then it is time we got rid of Him.”

“Thus stands it with me: upon a true contract I got possession of Julietta’s bed. You know the lady. She is fast my wife, Save that we do the denunciation lack Of outward order:”

“It all came flooding back to him now—swaying and humming along with the prayers, craning his neck to see the Torah when it was taken out of the ark and hoping to get a chance to touch it and then kiss his fingers as the scroll came around in a procession. Josef felt his skin tingle. The Nazis had taken all this from them, from him, and now he and the passengers on the ship were taking it back.”

“Muslim women should dress traditionally and wear a scarf, even though he always wore western gear.”