I think if you place Jesus firmly in the historical context... you can make very educated hypotheses and guesses about how he lived.

I really believe that to have a full impression of Jesus, both as Christ as a man, you must know about the world that gave shape to him - the world out of which he arose.

Religion, it must be understood, is not faith. Religion is the story of faith.

Islamophobia has become so mainstream in this country that Americans have been trained to expect violence against Muslims - not excuse it, but expect it. And that's happened because you have an Islamophobia industry in this country devoted to making Americans think there's an enemy within.

Is it possible that Jesus, unlike 98 percent of his fellow Jews, was literate and educated? Yes, it's possible.

I think if you place Jesus firmly in the historical context... you can make very educated hypotheses and guesses about how he lived.

Religion doesn't make people bigots. People are bigots and they use religion to justify their ideology.