As all historians know, the past is a great darkness, and filled with echoes. Voices may reach us from it; but what they say to us is imbued with the obscurity of the matrix out of which they come; and try as we may, we cannot always decipher them precisely in the clearer light of our day.
Margaret AtwoodThe use of "religion" as an excuse to repress the freedom of expression and to deny human rights is not confined to any country or time.
Margaret AtwoodI'm with the spirit of Earth-Day-yet-to-come. Nobody can really predict the future, all you can do is look at trends, and that could change at any moment.
Margaret AtwoodThe interesting thing about the religious component, for me, is that Jesus hardly mentions sex at all. He's pretty interested in the poor, he's pretty interested in selling your worldly goods and storing up riches in heaven. However, religious fundamentalists have made it all about sex, and that's like saying, "Look at the sex and we're just not going to talk about what you may be doing in a financial way that is sinful."
Margaret AtwoodI wish this story were different. I wish it were more civilized. I wish it showed me in a better light, if not happier, than at least more active, less hesitant, less distracted by trivia. I wish it had more shape. I wish t were about love, or about sudden realizations important to oneโs life, or even about sunsets, birds, rainstorms, or snow. Iโm sorry there is so much pain in this story. Iโm sorry itโs in fragments, like a body caught in crossfire or pulled apart by force. But there is nothing I can do to change it.
Margaret Atwood