The more intelligent and competent a woman is in her adult life, the less likely she is to have received an adequate amount of romantic attention in adolescence.

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.

It's something fundamental to me, human rights that people are equal under law simply because they are human beings. And I can no more imagine falling in love with someone who believed, for instance, as Orthodox Jews do, that women are unclean during their menstrual periods.

One of the interesting things is is that Judaism was very attractive to the Roman aristocracy.

I don't ever participate in debates about the existence or nonexistence of God because I can't imagine why anyone would be persuaded one way or the other by such things.

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.

Religious education is only valuable intellectually, if the child is educated in a religion versus [just] about a religion. I don't believe you can have both.