Jeremiah Wright Quotes

I hope for an America where the power of faith will always burn brightly, but where no modern inquisition of any kind will ever light the fires of fear, coercion, or angry division.

Religious factions will go on imposing their will on others unless the decent people connected to them recognize that religion has no place in public policy. They must learn to make their views known without trying to make their views the only alternatives.

Our society is pluralistic. We who accept the privilege of membership in that society agree to respect the people's right to live by their own religious precepts.

Many of us, both Jews and Christians, want the public square to be pluralistic, which is neither partisan nor naked.

Trouble no one about their religion; respect others in their view, and demand that they respect yours …. Show respect to all people and grovel to none.

We are a people of faith. We have been so secure in that faith that we have enshrined in our Constitution protection for people who profess no faith. And good for us for doing so. That is what the First Amendment is all about.

I believe in an America that is officially neither Catholic, Protestant, or Jewish - where religious liberty is so indivisible that an act against one church is treated as an act against all.

Religious freedom does not mean freedom from religion.

Yes, believers and non-believers and skeptics can all live together and get along. But there cannot be an imperialistic imposition of religion by the state or by the church. All people must be equal--believers, skeptics, disbelievers, atheists, and those who chose religion. Unless we are all deemed equal, and unless the morality of disbelief is deemed the equivalent of the morality of belief, we will simply be tolerated, and that is not the American way.

I have no argument with those who see in organized religion a template or an imperative to live life according to a prescribed set of beliefs. Just give others the room, within the laws of civil society, to believe or not believe whatever they like.

I want the French people to respect values that allow each individual to practice his or her faith, but in the frame of our common rules of secularism.

Terror will crash down on us if we fail to understand that a pluralistic society requires the personal and daily commitment of every citizen.

The way to silence religious disputes is to take no notice of them.

Politics are beautiful. They enable a community to live collectively with one another. It's not about stabbing each other in the back; it's about enabling people to reach their dreams and pursue happiness.

The great thing is that whether we have faith or not, we are by and large very tolerant of people, whatever their particular view.

God did not burden the United States with a diversity of backgrounds, ideas and religions, He blessed America with them.

I would not, under any circumstances, try to impose my personal faith and belief on the rest of the country. I don't think that's right. I don't think that's appropriate.

We are a people of many different religions and many different faiths. The only way forward in a pluralistic society of diverse faiths such as ours is to have laws that protect and respect the freedom of all, equally.

… tolerance is essential to protect one's own religion and one's own deeply held religious beliefs from external manipulation or efforts to overcome them, perhaps from other religions that are pushing in the opposite direction. That is the basic reason for religious tolerance.

I hope for an America where neither "fundamentalist" nor "humanist" will be a dirty word, but a fair description of the different ways in which people of good will look at life and into their own souls.

A secular state can offer security to Muslims since it is compatible with acknowledging that religion is important and, that in a religiously plural environment the state does not allow believers in one religious tradition to enjoy a privileged status. All are citizens with equal rights.

One man's religion neither harms nor helps another man.

I like the pluralism of modernity; it doesn't threaten me or my faith. And if one's faith is dependent on being reinforced in every aspect of other people's lives, then it is a rather insecure faith, don't you think?

The condition of our survival in any but the meagerest existence is our willingness to accommodate ourselves to the conflicting interests of others, to learn to live in a social world.

What does religious freedom look like? As America gets more religiously diverse, the concept is getting harder to define …. You can get 10 different groups in the room and they will disagree about what religious liberty is.