I feel culturally Jewish because of the way that I have lived my adult life.

I no more believe in the God of the Jews than I believe in any God.

It is hard to think of conversion as a blinding light on the road to Damascus, or as a highly spiritual or intellectual process, when the light comes from a flickering television; the voice of the deity is Bishop Sheen and you have drilled your father on his catechism answers...I was troubled at a young age by the idea that pouring water over someone's head could change both his relationship to God.

A person can be religious and still respect secular values and not talk about Jesus all the time as though every American believed in Jesus.

hope is not a plan of action.

If you believe in what I do, which is secular humanism, I would find it extremely difficult to live with someone - not to love someone - but to live with somebody and build a life of someone who disagreed with me on something so fundamental.

I can no more imagine falling in love with someone who believed that than I can imagine falling in love with someone who believes that blacks shouldn't be able to vote and are inferior to whites.