“Thanksgiving is a typically American holiday. In spite of its religious form (giving thanks to God for a good harvest), its essential, secular meaning is a celebration of successful production. It is a producers’ holiday. The lavish meal is a symbol of the fact that abundant consumption is the result and reward of production. Abundance is (or was and ought to be) America’s pride-just as it is the pride of American parents that their children need never know starvation.” KnowsNeedsGivingChildrenFactsAmericaFormParentReligiousResultsSuccessfulPrideOughtEssentialsRewardsProductionsProducersThanksSymbolsMealsAbundanceSpiteHolidayCelebrationConsumptionSecularHarvestStarvation Author:Ayn Rand
“In America, religious dissent is as vital as it is elusive. Like the secretions of the pituitary, the juices of dissent are essential to ongoing life even if we do not always know precisely how, when or where they perform their tasks, and the not knowing - the flimsy, filmy elusiveness - is supremely characteristic of America's expressions of religious dissent. For in the United States no stalwart orthodoxy stands ever ready to parry the sharp thrust or clever feints of dissent.” IfsKnowsStatesAmericaReligiousUnitedUnited StatesKnowingAtheismReadyExpressionEssentialsTasksCleverCharacteristicsNot KnowingJuiceOngoingDissentThrustOrthodoxyElusiveStalwartElusiveness Author:Edwin Gaustad
“If we would find God amid all the religious externals we must first determine to find Him, and then proceed in the way of simplicity. Now as always God discovers Himself to "babes" and hides Himself in thick darkness from the wise and the prudent. We must simplify our approach to Him. We must strip down to essentials (and they will be found to be blessedly few). We must put away all effort to impress, and come with the guileless candor of childhood. If we do this, without doubt God will quickly respond.” IfsWayFirstsFoundReligiousEffortDarknessDoubtWiseChildhoodEssentialsApproachSimplicityDetermineGods WillThickImpressSimplifyBabePrudentCandor Author:Aiden Wilson Tozer
“Through my Faith-Based and Community Initiative, my Administration continues to encourage the essential work of faith-based and community organizations. Governments can and should support effective social services, including those provided by religious people and organizations. When government gives that support, it is important that faith-based institutions not be forced to change their religious character.” PeopleGivingShouldImportantCharacterHumorGovernmentPoliticalSocialCommunityReligiousSupportEssentialsOrganizationInstitutionsIncludingAdministrationInitiativePolitical HumorSocial ServiceFaith Based Author:George W. Bush
“Erecting the 'wall of separation between church and state'... is absolutely essential in a free society.” StatesReligionChurchReligiousWallEssentialsSeparationChurch And StateSeparation Of Church And StateFree SocietyReligious FreedomFounding Fathers ChristianClergySeparation Between Church And StateFounding Fathers Anti ReligionFounding Fathers AtheistReligion ChristianChristian FatherReligion In SocietyUnresponsiveChristian FreedomHate Religion Author:Thomas Jefferson
“[T]he bill exceeds the rightful authority to which governments are limited by the essential distinction between civil and religious functions, and violates in particular the article of the Constitution of the United States which declares that Congress shall make no law respecting a religious establishment.... This particular church, therefore, would so far be a religious establishment by law, a legal force and sanction being given to certain articles in its constitution and administration.” StatesGovernmentLawCertainGivenForceChurchReligiousUnitedUnited StatesAtheismParticularEssentialsAuthorityFunctionConstitutionBillsCongressPositive AtheismAdministrationDistinctionArticlesEstablishmentExceedSanctionsConstitution Of The United States Author:James Madison
“The State may justify a limitation on religious liberty by showing it is essential to accomplish an overriding governmental interest.” MayStatesChristianInterestReligiousLibertyEssentialsAccomplishLimitationJustifyReligious Liberty Author:Warren E. Burger
“No one expects this nation to become a theocracy, where Christianity is the only value, but we do indeed say that the essential values and founding principles of the nation should not be ignored.” ShouldChristianValuesNationsReligiousChristianityPrinciplesEssentialsIgnoredFoundingTheocracy Author:D. James Kennedy
“I remain a religious agnostic, but, unlike most atheists, I not only am not hostile to traditional religion but consider it a highly valuable, not to say essential, social institution... I am convinced that the moral regeneration and repair of a frayed social fabric that this country so badly needs will not take place unless more people take their religion seriously.” PeopleNeedsCountryChristianSocialReligiousMoralEssentialsInstitutionsAtheistValuableConvincedTraditionalFabricAgnosticHostileRegenerationSocial Institutions Book:Why America Needs Religion: Secular Modernity and Its Discontents Source: Why America Needs Religion: Secular Modernity and Its Discontents
“Determined secularists view these as residual inconsistencies that they have not yet go around to extirpating and that may not be worth bothering about... Form the secularist perspective it may be that the essential battles have been won and excessive zeal in pressing a final mopping-up operation might only excited further public hostility.” MayHas BeensMightChristianFormReligiousViewsPerspectiveBattleEssentialsFinalsExcitedDeterminedBotherOperationsHostilityZealInconsistencyResidualMoppingMopping Up Author:Richard John Neuhaus
“A sense of continuity with the rest of creation is a form of religious experience essential to sanity.” FormReligionReligiousCreationEssentialsSanityContinuityReligious Experience Author:Rene Dubos