A Quote by Marilynne Robinson

I'm a great admirer of secularism. At its best, I think it's one of the best things that we have. I don't believe in insinuating religion into conversation. I don't believe in excluding it from conversation. I enjoy the fact that people's innermost thoughts are their own.

Marilynne Robinson

Quote Topics

Admirer Believe Best Best Things Conversation Don't Believe Enjoy Fact Great Innermost Own People Religion Secularism Things Think Thoughts

Quote Author

Marilynne Robinson
American - Novelist
Born: November 26, 1943

If people are rude, that may be the end of the conversation, and maybe we won't have a subsequent conversation. But I believe in giving people the benefit of the doubt and believing the best about the person.

Michele Bachmann

The reading of all good books is indeed like a conversation with the noblest men of past centuries who were the authors of them, nay a carefully studied conversation, in which they reveal to us none but the best of their thoughts.

Rene Descartes

You can be non-judgmental, but you don't want to be non-discerning because, remember, the force of evolution is the conversation, you know: two truths standing up to each other in conversation, and the best truth emerges, and the best truth prevails.

James Redfield

I think women are deeply interested in a conversation around fertility. It's not a conversation just for one age group of women, a conversation if you're post 30 or post 35. This [is] conversation about reproduction, about taking your own power with you and deciding for yourself.

Staceyann Chin

I like challenges and I don't believe in failure. I don't believe in regrets. I believe suffering, failure - all those concepts - are things that are absolutely necessary to make us the best people that we can be, the best at whatever we want to do.

Jim Carrey

The more I think about myself, the more I'm persuaded that, as a person, I really don't exist. That is one of the reasons why I can't believe in any orthodox religion: I cannot believe in my own soul. No, I am a chemical compound, conditioned by environment and education. My "character" is simply a repertoire of acquired tricks, my conversation a repertoire of adaptations and echoes, my "feelings" are dictated by purely physical, external stimuli.

Christopher Isherwood

Things I am allergic to: people who believe in star signs and think nothing of starting a conversation with: 'Hi, my name's Lucy. I'm a Sagittarius;' rodents (apart from miniature hamsters, which are not in fact rodents but small, breathing, brown balls of cotton wool); and people who go to the gym.

Claudia Winkleman

Believe in your dreams. Believe in today. Believe that you are loved. Believe that you make a difference. Believe we can build a better world. Believe when others might not. Believe there's a light at the end of the tunnel. Believe that you might be that light for someone else. Believe that the best is yet to be. Believe in each other. Believe in yourself. I believe in you.

Kobi Yamada

The best any human can do is to pick a delusion that helps him get through the day. This is why people of different religions can generally live in peace. At some level, we all suspect that other people don't believe their own religion any more than we believe ours.

Scott Adams

We believe that there is no greater power in the world than the force of a great idea. We believe that people are the lifeblood of every organization. We believe that the best companies are true meritocracies, where people rise and fall through their own contributions, not through game playing or politics. We believe that work isn't simply a paycheck; it is the ultimate expression of a fully realized self. We believe that a company's obligations extend far beyond its bottom line and its shareholders - to a wider constituency that includes employees, customers, suppliers, and the community.

John A. Byrne

The First Amendment...does not say that in every respect there shall be a separation of Church and State....Otherwise the state and religion would be aliens to each other - hostile, suspicious, and even unfriendly....The state may not establish a 'religion of secularism' in the sense of affirmatively opposing or showing hostility to religion, thus preferring those who believe in no religion over those who do believe.

William O. Douglas

Some people believe the alternative to bad religion is secularism, but that's wrong . . . . The answer to bad religion is better religion--prophetic rather than partisan, broad and deep instead of narrow, and based on values as opposed to ideology.

Jim Wallis

You have to be an original individual; you have to find your innermost core on your own, with no guide, no guiding scriptures. It is a dark night, but with the intense fire of inquiry you are bound to come to the sunrise. Everybody who has burned with intense inquiry has found the sunrise. Others only believe. Those who believe are not religious, they are simply avoiding the great adventure of religion by believing.

Rajneesh

That's what the best art does, it starts the conversation. What you may see in a scene or a line isn't what I might see, but that conversation we have, that's how we move forward.

Misha Green

She was not often invited to join in the conversation of the others, nor did she desire it. Her own thoughts and reflections were habitually her best companions.