Penn Jillette Quotes

Particularly as a Jew, I don't like missionary work. I've had it focused on me, and I don't like it. Let people be what they want to be.

The proselytizing fanatic strengthens his own faith by converting others. The creed whose legitimacy is most easily challenged is likely to develop the strongest proselytizing impulse.

Although most Christian churches advocate some sort of mission to non-Christians, no Jewish group advocates a mission to non-Jews. Proselytization seems to be foreign to Judaism.

Mormons know that it's not enough to practise your religion - you also have to spread your religion.

Why do born-again people so often make you wish they'd never been born the first time?

Some religious practitioners make absolutist claims for their beliefs: I've no interest in doing this, nor do I have any interest in converting people, which is doubtless a relief to anyone who has feared finding me on their doorstep asking if they'd like to know more about Odin.

No Christian would pray for violence but it would be utterly naïve to sweep the issue of Islam under the carpet. Let no Muslim think that they have the monopoly on violence.

It's the responsibility of men of religion to ... present religion as a way of tolerance, not as a cover for bloodshed.

The problem of Islam as a political force is an essential one for our time and for the years to come, and we cannot approach it with a modicum of intelligence if we start out from a position of hatred.

When a Mormon knocks, they say, 'Can I teach you about Jesus Christ?' And if you say no, they'll say, 'Then how can I be of service to you?' So anybody who was smart would be like, 'You can take out my trash and mow my lawn.'

[Castellani's testimony] clearly illustrates the concern we have that there is no way to separate the efforts to proselytize from the efforts to reform people.

There are folks who burn the Koran and hold signs saying, "God hates fags" and all sorts of sick things - and they often hijack the headlines with hatred. We know that is not what Christ was like.

Nowhere have the forces of intolerance been displayed less tolerantly than in the area of religious speech and practice.

I come from a culture that embodies the need to convert others to "the truth." The Mormon Church has one of the largest missionary programs in the world. That does not interest me.

I wish I could meet a Christian who would proselytize to me, but they keep running away from me. I wanna talk to you all.

To make converts is the natural ambition of everyone.

Christians are beginning to lose the spirit of intolerance which animated them: experience has shown the error of the expulsion of the Jews from Spain, and of the persecution of those Christians in France whose belief differed a little from that of the king. They have realized that zeal for the advancement of religion is different from a due attachment to it; and that in order to love it and fulfil its behests, it is not necessary to hate and persecute those who are opposed to it.

If someone spreads hate then they're not your religious leader.

When people unfortunately use religion to facilitate their envy, arrogance and hate, communalism surfaces.

That religious earnestness forever tends toward fright and hence towards brittleness and inquisition is clear enough in mythology and history.

Religious wars are not caused by the fact that there is more than one religion, but by the spirit of intolerance... the spread of which can only be regarded as the total eclipse of human reason.

The only way we can challenge Islamism is to engage with one another. We need to make it as abhorrent as racism has become today. Only then will we stem the tide of angry young Muslims who turn to hate.

To know a person's religion we need not listen to his profession of faith but must find his brand of intolerance.

The first time someone tried to share the Gospel with me, I naively explained that I was Jewish and born in Israel, thank you... This was a big mistake. In certain parts of Christian America, admitting I was an Israeli-born Jew turned me into walking catnip.

I personally would not talk to a Jew for Jesus.