Leila Slimani Quotes

To the millions of non-Christians who live in this country, “our” culture is not their culture and they have not assimilated Christmas carols. Most people take their religion far too seriously to look upon religious songs as forms of art only. The day “Silent Night” is sung in Buddhist Temples and Jewish Synagogues throughout the United States is the day that “Silent Night” will have been assimilated into “our” culture.”

I was born Muslim, but for a large part of my life, I wasn't necessarily raised Muslim. My father always kept everything around us, from Western philosophy to Eastern philosophy.

The fact of simultaneously being Christian and having as my mother tongue Arabic, the holy language of Islam, is one of the basic paradoxes that have shaped my identity.

I am a Jew, and every single one of my ancestors was Jewish. And it does not bother me even a little bit when people call those beautiful lit up, bejeweled trees Christmas trees. I don't feel threatened. I don't feel discriminated against.

I am a Londoner. I'm British. I'm of Islamic faith, Asian origin, Pakistani heritage, so whether it's ISIS or others who want to destroy our way of life and talk about the West, they're talking about me. What better antidote to the hatred they spew than someone like me being in this position.

There are those who argue that the public celebration of festivals such as Christmas should be discouraged, in the questionable belief that it might somehow offend those of other religions or none.

We even had a different word for Christmas in my language, Bengali: Baradin, which literally meant 'big day.'

On 'Black Hawk Down,' I was employing 1,000 Muslims. 'Kingdom of Heaven,' same deal except bigger, probably 1,500 Muslims.

I had siblings from South Asia, from East Asia, from depressed communities around America, and you know, we'd have long conversations.

There are plenty of Muslims who live faithfully in the United States.

Every religion in the world has denounced every other religion as a fraud. That proves to me that they all tell the truth - about others.

I was not comfortable worshipping another Jew.

People's identities as Indians, as Asians, or as members of the human race, seemed to give way - quite suddenly - to sectarian identification with Hindu, Muslim, or Sikh communities.

Scientology is not a white religion. It is not just for white people.

Knowledge about religions is not only characteristic of an educated person, but is also absolutely necessary for understanding and living in a world of diversity.

Our culture is superior because our religion is Christianity.

We in the West tend to think of a nation subdivided into different religions. Islam sees itself as a religion subdivided into different nations.

In Spain you are a Catholic or you are nothing.

Here in Spain we are all Catholics, even the atheists.

The Ottoman authorities saw their ability to absorb people of all faiths as a sign of power, not weakness, and observed the Protestant-Catholic conflicts of the time with detached bemusement.

I was always in new schools and had British parents, which was not the norm, and I think there was also... I'm not particularly religious, but I was born Jewish, and I always felt like the outsider because I wasn't Christian or Catholic.

It's astounding the degree to which these communities are intermarried. Iraq is a crazy quilt of ethnicities and religious sects.

There are some who believe that secularism and Islam are not compatible. But Muslims should show everyone that this is not the case. It's up to them to show that you can be French and Muslim and still respect secular rules.

I would never agree to an exclusive Muslim sovereignty over areas that are religiously important to Jews and Christians.

We always do a white elephant gift exchange on Christmas Eve, but my mom always gets really nice gifts for it. And we hang out in our PJs on Christmas Day.