Talking, it seemed to me, was the point of adult existence.

If asked my opinion about virginity, I would say, "I'm opposed to it." I don't think it deserves to be celebrated, at any rate. Or at least, if I'm not opposed, I'm very highly skeptical and critical of it.

I was taught very early on that the state can be, and is, a liar and a murderer.

I have more than once in my time woken up feeling like death.

Religion, it is true, still possesses the huge if cumbersome and unwieldy advantage of having come first.

Religion gets its morality from us. We don't get our morality from religion.

In the ordinary moral universe, the good will do the best they can, the worst will do the worst they can, but if you want to make good people do wicked things, you’ll need religion.