Daily quotes

[Creed of Heresy]

And this one is perhaps my favorite of the three I picked out today...

“I want an avowed atheist in the White House. When time comes to push that button, I want whoever's making the decision to understand that once it's pushed, it's over. Finito. They're not gonna have lunch with Jesus. Won't be deflowering 72 virgins on the great shag carpet of eternity, or reincarnated as a cow. I want someone making that decision who believes life on this Earth isn't just a dress rehearsal for something better -- but the only shot we get.”
― Quentin R. Bufogle

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“Alcohol makes other people less tedious, and food less bland, and can help provide what the Greeks called entheos, or the slight buzz of inspiration when reading or writing. The only worthwhile miracle in the New Testament—the transmutation of water into wine during the wedding at Cana—is a tribute to the persistence of Hellenism in an otherwise austere Judaea. The same applies to the seder at Passover, which is obviously modeled on the Platonic symposium: questions are asked (especially of the young) while wine is circulated. No better form of sodality has ever been devised: at Oxford one was positively expected to take wine during tutorials. The tongue must be untied. It's not a coincidence that Omar Khayyam, rebuking and ridiculing the stone-faced Iranian mullahs of his time, pointed to the value of the grape as a mockery of their joyless and sterile regime. Visiting today's Iran, I was delighted to find that citizens made a point of defying the clerical ban on booze, keeping it in their homes for visitors even if they didn't particularly take to it themselves, and bootlegging it with great brio and ingenuity. These small revolutions affirm the human.”
― Christopher Hitchens, Hitch-22: A Memoir

One more, I needed to throw a Hitchslap in there.

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“Eskimo: "If I did not know about God and sin, would I go to hell?"
Priest: "No, not if you did not know."
Eskimo: "Then why did you tell me?”
― Annie Dillard

OK THAT'S THE LAST ONE for today I SWEAR.

[Creed of Heresy]

“By Hays' reasoning, penetrating a rectum with a penis is a violation of how God meant humans to function. However, penetrating a human body with a sword, a common way to kill people in biblical times, is acceptable. Apparently human bodies were designed to be penetrated by metal implements, but not by flesh.”
― Hector Avalos

Heh heh heh.

[Creed of Heresy]

“It is hard to see how a great man can be an atheist. Without the sustaining influence of faith in a divine power we could have little faith in ourselves. We need to feel that behind us is intelligence and love. Doubters do not achieve; skeptics do not contribute; cynics do not create. Faith is the great motive power, and no man realizes his full possibilities unless he has the deep conviction that life is eternally important, and that his work, well done, is a part of an unending plan.”
― Calvin Coolidge, former president of the US, big-time supporter of laissez-faire government, and a man who later admitted to a friend shortly before his death, "I feel I no longer fit in with these times."

I suppose at the time he was right, of course; doubters did NOT achieve because to ever express religious doubt, skepticism, or cynicism meant you were looked down upon, given that these were the days of the Monkey Trials, essentially halting you from achieving, contributing, or creating anything that anyone would take notice of. And way to go, Coolidge. Doubters don't achieve... Sorry, Mr. Einstein, but you just didn't achieve anything, what with your doubts on religion or the existence of a personal god and your theory of relativity and such! Skeptics don't contribute? Sorry, 85% of modern scientists, you just aren't really contributing anything at all! Cynics create nothing? Please. Where do I even begin with that one? How many artists do you guys know who AREN'T cynical to some extent?? Some of the best artists of current times are cynical in one way or another. Fuckin' Isaac Asimov was cynical as hell. Douglas Adams? H.P. Lovecraft?

He was right about one thing though.

"I feel I no longer fit in with these times."

Quite, Mr. Coolide. Quite.

[Minimalist]

My earlier views of the unsoundness of the Christian scheme of salvation and the human origin of the scriptures, have become clearer and stronger with advancing years and I see no reason for thinking I shall ever change them.
-- Abraham Lincoln

[Creed of Heresy]

“It will not do to investigate the subject of religion too closely, as it is apt to lead to infidelity.”
― Abraham Lincoln, speaking without irony but instead with wit.

[Angrboda]

"A child of five would understand this. Send someone to fetch a child of five."

Groucho Marx

[The Grand Nudger]

Abraham Lincoln kick eh.......?

"We can complain because rose bushes have thorns, or rejoice because thorn bushes have roses."

[Angrboda]

"Take thy place a few seats below thy rank until thou art bidden to take a higher place; for it is better
that they should say to thee 'Come up higher' than that they should bid thee 'Go down lower'"

Rabbi Akiva ben Joseph

[Creed of Heresy]

“It is notorious that the news of the Emancipation Proclamation was kept from the people of Texas and not celebrated until 'Juneteenth'. There may be those in Texas now who believe they can insulate their state—a state that had its own courageous revolution—from the news of evolution and from the writing in 1786 of a Constitution that refuses to mention religion except when demarcating and limiting its role in the public square. But we promise them today that they will join their fore-runners in the flat-earth community, and in the mad clerical clique of those who believed that the sun revolved around the earth. Yes, they will be in schoolbooks—as a joke on the epic scale of William Jennings Bryan. We shall be fair, and take care to ensure that their tale is told.”
― Christopher Hitchens

[Cyberman]

"Take thy place a few seats below thy rank until thou art bidden to take a higher place; for it is better that they should say to thee 'Come up higher' than that they should bid thee 'Go down lower'"

Hmm, not sure this would be a better thing in every situation...