In an unconstitutional partnership with the state, the church can impose the most irresistible, if covert, controls conceivable.

When I started going to church, my first memories are of the minister getting up and accusing us of being full of sin, though he didn't say why; then they would pass the collection plate, and I got it in my mind that this had to do with purification of the soul, that we were being invited to buy expiation from our sins. So I gave it all up. It was too nonsensical.

I feel that everyone who wants to say anything, do anything, should be able to say anything or do anything, within the limits of not hurting another person.

I recall that I had a terrible struggle finding anything antireligious in the school libraries.But many years later my family moved into a house where a woman had left a box of books containing 20 volumes on the history of the Inquisition. I found out there was a word for people like me: "heretic." I was kind of delighted to find I had an identity.

I think this word 'disbelieve' would be the best of all possible worlds if everybody were an atheist or an agnostic or a humanist - his or her own particular brand - but as for compelling people to this, absolutely not.

Those so-called records in the Bible were written by devout ecclesiasts who wanted to believe, and wanted others to believe, in the coming of a Messiah. Until someone proves otherwise, therefore, these stories must be considered nothing more than folk tales consisting in equal parts of legend and wish fulfillment.

Actually, I don't like Atheists very much - at least most of them ~ because they are not motivated to move into the community and attempt to correct the injustices which are everywhere apparent against them.