Dan Barker Quotes
-
Either in or out of time, the decision of a personal agency to commit an action happens antecedent to the action itself. Even if the deciding and the acting happened simultaneously, it would still not be true that the acting was antecedent to the deciding. Imagine God saying, "Oh, look! I just created a universe. Now I'd better decide to do it.
-
The longer I have been an atheist, the more amazed I am that I ever believed Christian notions.
-
As humanists, we urge today, as in the past that humans not look beyond themselves for salvation. We alone are responsible for our own destiny and the best we can do is muster our intelligence, courage, and compassion to realize our highest aspirations.
-
Prayer never changes the laws of nature.
-
Only sinners need saviors.
-
Even if it is true that all cultures share a common morality, why does this prove a supreme intelligence? After all, don't we humanists sometimes claim that there is a common thread of humanistic values running through history across cultural and religious lines?
-
People are always asking, "What's the purpose of life?" That's easy. Relieve suffering. Create beauty. Make gardens.
-
If the answers to prayer are merely what God wills all along, then why pray?
-
I took about a year to fully adjust. Like there's a death at the family or a divorce, you don't just snap your fingers and it's over.
-
There is no evidence for a god, no coherent definition of a god, no good argument for a god, good positive arguments against a god, no agreement among believers about the nature or moral principles of a god, and no need for a god. We can live happy, moral, productive lives without such belief, and we can do it better.
-
In any open question, we should argue from what we do know to what we do not know. We do know that fervent legends and stubborn myths arise easily and naturally. We do not know that dead people rise from the grave.