Louis XIV Quotes

Arab Christians are not Christians, I am not leaving them until they become Muslims or I cut their throats.

Adherents of almost all religions, as they move away in time from the source, are invariably known to have employed coercion either to keep people within the fold of their religion, or to convert others into their faith.

The religion that has to be supported by law is without value, not only, but a fraud and a curse. The religious argument that has to be supported by a musket is hardly worth making.

I have always marveled that so many religions exact such revenge against dissenters. It only weakens the appeal of their faith and contradicts any claims they might have made that 'all religions are basically the same.' If all religions were indeed the same, why not let someone be 'converted' to another religion?

Millions of innocent men, women, and children, since the introduction of Christianity, have been burnt, tortured, fined, and imprisoned; yet we have not advanced one inch toward uniformity. What has been the effect of coercion? To make one-half the world fools and the other half hypocrites.

We allow none ... to be dragged to the alters unwillingly.

[This law] forbids the exercise of any other religion than the Catholic…. all Jews who may have established their religion there [shall] be expelled within three months, under penalty of confiscation of body and property

Catholic Menace to Our Government

Damn this world, Damn this time. Damn this fate That uncivilized Arabs have come to make me a Moslem

No religion has mandated killing others as a requirement for its sustenance or promotion.

There is nothing intrinsic linking any religion with any act of violence. The crusades don't prove that Christianity was violent. The Inquisition doesn't prove that Christianity tortures people. But that Christianity did torture people.

Historically, more people have died of religion than cancer.

Persecution is not an original feature in any religion; but it is always the strongly marked feature of all religions established by law.

Kill the unbelievers wherever you find them, capture and besiege them and prepare for them every kind of ambush…But if they repent and establish worship and pay the poor-due, then leave their way free.

Freedom of religion also implies the right not to have or profess a religion. This is sometimes overlooked. It is a sad commentary on religion that religionists, probably quite well-meaning at times, have throughout history tried to force fellow human beings into a required religious mold. Apart from the very wrong theological assumptions involved, this is a flagrant violation of the dignity of the human person. Coerced religion is demeaning and of little value.

We’re not fighting for Christianity but against human fanaticism of all kinds.

Invade their (Moslems) country. Kill their leaders. Convert them to Christianity.

We decree that no Christian shall use violence to compel the Jews to accept baptism.

You have condemned them [Protestants]. You have not refuted them. Where do you read in the Bible that Christ, the apostles, and the prophets imprisoned, banished, burned, or murdered anyone?

We forbid our subjects .... to meet any more for the exercise of the said religion in any place or private house, under any pretext whatever, .... We enjoin all [Protestant] ministers … who do not choose to become converts and to embrace the Catholic, apostolic, and Roman religion, to leave our kingdom and the territories subject to us within a fortnight of the publication of our present edict, without leave to reside therein beyond that period, or, during the said fortnight, to engage in any preaching, exhortation, or any other function, on pain of being sent to the galleys... .

It is prohibited to exercise any form of compulsion on man or to exploit his poverty or ignorance in order to convert him to another religion or to atheism.

Neither experience nor improvement can root out the inveterate prejudices of the Roman Catholics, or render them less cruel or inexorable to Protestants.

We also forbid all our subjects, of whatever quality and condition, from carrying off by force or persuasion, against the will of their parents, the children of the said religion, in order to cause them to be baptized or confirmed in the Catholic Apostolic and Roman Church; and the same is forbidden to those of the said religion pretended Reformed, upon penalty of being punished with especial severity.

There seems to be a concerted campaign to entice or kidnap Catholic Children and deprive them of their faith.

If we look back into history for the character of the present sects of Christianity, we shall find that few have not in their turn been persecutors, and complainers of persecution.