{"quotes":[{"text":"I do not go to church. I don’t go to Christian church or Jew church or any other church. I don’t go to church at all. Not ever. A perfect Sunday for me is spent drinking green tea while reading the Sunday New York Times. Yikes! Why don’t I just turn in my Al-Qaeda membership form and call it a day? As if that wasn’t bad enough, not only do I not go to church:I don’t believe in God. How can I say the Pledge of Allegiance if I don’t believe in God? How can I spend our American currency which pledges “In God We Trust?” How can I swear to tell the truth, the whole truth, so help me God? Answer: I can’t. It’s a real problem. Don’t get me wrong – I’d like to believe in God. I wish I did, especially if He was the kind of God that thought America was #1. But I don’t, which to many people is the same as not believing in America. Up until recently, I thought those people were lunatics.","author":"Michael Ian Black","tags":["al-qaeda","atheism","atheist","belief","blog","funny","humor","jew","jewish","opinion","separation-of-church-and-state"],"id":1529,"author_id":"Michael+Ian+Black"},{"text":"There is no such source and cause of strife, quarrel, fights, malignant opposition, persecution, and war, and all evil in the state, as religion. Let it once enter into our civil affairs, our government soon would be destroyed. Let it once enter our common schools, they would be destroyed. Those who made our Constitution saw this, and used the most apt and comprehensive language in it to prevent such a catast.","author":"Supreme Court of Wisconsin","tags":["catastrophe","constitution","constitutional","destruction","education","intolerance","law","malignant","quarrel","schooling","schools","science","separation-of-church-and-state","strife"],"id":14671,"author_id":"Supreme+Court+of+Wisconsin"},{"text":"From this we conclude, that, to live in harmony and peace…we must trace a line of distinction between those (assertions) that are capable of verification, and those that are not; (we must) separate by an inviolable barrier the world of fantastical beings from the world of realities.","author":"Constantin-François Volney","tags":["enlightenment-principles","fictional","harmony","peace","reality","scientific","separation-of-church-and-state","thomas-jefferson","thomas-jefferson-translation","verification"],"id":26122,"author_id":"Constantin-Fran%C3%A7ois+Volney"},{"text":"Persecution is not an original feature in any religion but it is always the strongly marked feature of all religions established by law. ","author":"Thomas Paine","tags":["christianity","religion","separation-of-church-and-state","skepticism"],"id":31897,"author_id":"Thomas+Paine"},{"text":"How dismal it is to see present day Americans yearning for the very orthodoxy that their country was founded to escape.","author":"Christopher Hitchens","tags":["atheism","fundamentalism","religion","secularism","separation-of-church-and-state","united-states","united-states-constitution"],"id":32626,"author_id":"Christopher+Hitchens"},{"text":"The liberty of man is not safe in the hands of any church. Wherever the Bible and sword are in partnership, man is a slave. All laws for the purpose of making man worship God, are born of the same spirit that kindled the fires of the auto da fe, and lovingly built the dungeons of the Inquisition. All laws defining and punishing blasphemy -- making it a crime to give your honest ideas about the Bible, or to laugh at the ignorance of the ancient Jews, or to enjoy yourself on the Sabbath, or to give your opinion of Jehovah, were passed by impudent bigots, and should be at once repealed by honest men. An infinite God ought to be able to protect himself, without going in partnership with State Legislatures. Certainly he ought not so to act that laws become necessary to keep him from being laughed at. No one thinks of protecting Shakespeare from ridicule, by the threat of fine and imprisonment. It strikes me that God might write a book that would not necessarily excite the laughter of his children. In fact, I think it would be safe to say that a real God could produce a work that would excite the admiration of mankind.","author":"Robert G. Ingersoll","tags":["inquisition","inspiration","jehovah","law","politics","religion","separation-of-church-and-state"],"id":42754,"author_id":"Robert+G.+Ingersoll"},{"text":"Creationists have also changed their name ... To intelligent design theorists who study 'irreducible complexity' and the 'abrupt appearance' of life—yet more jargon for 'God did it.' ... Notice that they have no interest in replacing evolution with native American creation myths or including the Code of Hammurabi alongside the posting of the Ten Commandments in public schools.","author":"Michael Shermer","tags":["code-of-hammurabi","creation-myths","creationists","evolution","first-amendment","god-did-it","goddidit","hammurabi","intelligent-design","irreducible-complexity","jargon","myths","native-american","origin-of-life","pseudoscience","school","science","separation-of-church-and-state","sophistry","superstition","ten-commandments"],"id":95495,"author_id":"Michael+Shermer"},{"text":"As to Science, she has never sought to ally herself to civil power. She has never attempted to throw odium or inflict social ruin on any human being. She has never subjected anyone to mental torment, physical torture, least of all to death, for the purpose of upholding or promoting her ideas. She presents herself unstained by cruelties and crimes. But in the Vatican—we have only to recall the Inquisition—the hands that are now raised in appeals to the 'Most Merciful' are crimsoned. They have been steeped in blood!","author":"John William Draper","tags":["blood","church-and-state","death","dogma","history","inquisition","intolerance","mental-torment","science","separation-of-church-and-state","torment","torture","vatican"],"id":119020,"author_id":"John+William+Draper"},{"text":"Almost any sect, cult, or religion will legislate its creed into law if it acquires the political power to do so.","author":"Robert A. Heinlein","tags":["cult","danger","law","organized-religion","power","religion","sect","separation-of-church-and-state"],"id":124695,"author_id":"Robert+A.+Heinlein"},{"text":"It is now established by verifiable evidence that religion stultifies the brain and is the great obstacle in the path of intellectual progress.The more religious a person is, the more he is steeped in ignorance and superstition, the less is his sense of moral responsibility. The more intelligent a person, the less religious he is. There is an old saying that 'where there are three scientists, there are two atheists.'The countries whose governments are dominated by religion and religious institutions are the most backward. By the same token, the countries whose people are the most enlightened, and whose governments are based upon the principle of secularism—the separation of church and state—are the most progressive.And let me tell you: When man is intellectually free, the progress he will make is beyond calculation.","author":"Joseph Lewis","tags":["atheists","brain","calculation","evidence","freedom","government","intellect","learning","morality","progress","scientists","separation-of-church-and-state","superstition"],"id":126065,"author_id":"Joseph+Lewis"}],"pagination":{"page":1,"page_size":10,"total":39,"pages":4,"next":"?page=2\u0026page_size=10"}}