“How many observe Christ’s birthday! How few his precepts!
O! ’tis easier to keep holidays than commandments.”
— Benjamin Franklin, Poor Richard’s Almanack, 1757.

“Jesus wasn’t a Christian, and he never preached in a church. He was also a drinker, and liked to hang out with sinners. We think of him very highly in the Church of Stop Shopping. We put him right up there with Lenny Bruce.”
— Reverend Billy

Every day people are straying away from the church and going back to God.
— Lenny Bruce

“To hear many religious people talk, one would think God created the torso, head, legs and arms, but the devil slapped on the genitals.”
— Don Schrader

“Christian fundamentalism: The doctrine that there is an absolutely powerful, infinitely knowledgeable, universe-spanning entity that is deeply and personally concerned about my sex life.”
— Andrew Lias

“The problem with fundamentalists insisting on a literal interpretation of the Bible is that the meaning of words change. A prime example is ‘Spare the rod, spoil the child.’ A rod was a stick used by shepherds to guide their sheep to go in the desired direction. Shepherds did not use it to beat their sheep. The proper translation of the saying is ‘Give your child guidance, or they will go astray.’ It does not mean ‘Beat the sh*t out of your child or he will become rotten’ as many fundamentalist parents seem to believe.”
— Author Unknown

“I read about an Eskimo hunter who asked the local missionary priest, ‘If I did not know about God and sin, would I go to hell?’ ‘No,’ said the priest, ‘not if you did not know.’ ‘Then why,’ asked the Eskimo earnestly, ‘did you tell me?'”
— Annie Dillard

“Give a man a fish, and you’ll feed him for a day; give him a religion, and he’ll starve to death while praying for a fish.”
— Author Unknown

“Christianity is not a religion; it’s an industry.”
— Author Unknown

“You can safely assume that you’ve created God in your own image when it turns out that God hates all the same people you do.”
— Anne Lamott

“An infinite God ought to be able to protect Himself, without going in partnership with State Legislatures.”
— Robert Ingersoll

“There is no point in saying that one should not doubt or one should believe. Just to say ‘I believe’ does not mean that you understand and see… To force oneself to believe and to accept a thing without understanding is political, and not spiritual or intellectual.”
— Walpola Rahula, “What the Buddha Taught.”

“Going to church doesn’t make you a Christian anymore than going to the garage makes you a car.”
— Dr. Laurence J. Peter

“No man is a Christian who cheats his fellows, perverts the truth, or speaks of a ‘clean bomb,’ yet he will be the first to make public his faith in God.”
— Marya Mannes in 1956.

“Great hypocrites are the true atheists.”
— Sir Francis Bacon (1561-1626).

“Ye hypocrites, well did Isaiah prophesy of you, saying,
This people draweth nigh unto me with their mouth, and honoreth me with their lips, but their heart is far from me
But in vain they do worship me, teaching for doctrine the commandments of men.”
— Jesus, Matthew 15:7-9, KJV.