The problem is that religion tends to give people bad reasons to be good.

Martin Luther and John Calvin advocated the wholesale murder of heretics, apostates, Jews, and witches.

Moderates want their faith respected. They don't want faith itself criticized, and yet faith itself is what is bringing us all this - this lunacy.

Strange bonds of trust and self-deception tend to grow between journalists and their subjects.

In my own case, the most inflammatory statements I have ever made are ones that I have written and remain willing to defend.

How can we encourage other human beings to extend their moral sympathies beyond a narrow locus? How can we learn to become mere human beings, shorn of any more compelling national, ethnic, or religious identity? We can be reasonable. It is in the very nature of reason to fuse cognitive and moral horizons. Reason is nothing less than the guardian of love.

To treat others ethically is to act out of concern for their happiness and suffering.