Don’t say I hate institutionalised religion – rather than saying I hate those things, which I do not, what I’m saying is that perhaps there is a way of opening more doors, rather than closing so many.

What is the Tao Te Ching? Five hundred years before the birth of Jesus, a God-realized being named Lao-tzu in ancient China dictated 81 verses which are regarded by many as the ultimate commentary on the nature of existence.

Remember, we are not human beings having a spiritual experience. We are spiritual beings having a human experience.

It’s a mystery. That’s the first thing that interests me about the idea of God. If there is one, it’s mysterious and powerful and awesome to even consider the concept, and you have to take it seriously.

To insure the adoration of a theorem for any length of time, faith is not enough, a police force is needed as well.

Behold, I stand at the door and knock. If anyone hears my voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and eat with him, and he with me.

Grow in the root of all grace, which is faith. Believe God’s promises more firmly than ever. Allow your faith to increase in its fullness, firmness, and simplicity.

Custom reconciles us to everything.

I want to support other women because of the opportunities I’ve had – and I’ve had a lot of opportunities. What I try as a female director is to do the best job I can and, in the meantime, bring attention to as many other female directors and writers as I can.

I maintain that Truth is a pathless land, and you cannot approach it by any path whatsoever, by any religion, by any sect.

Do not fear to be eccentric in opinion, for every opinion now accepted was once eccentric.

In prayer, we stand where angels bow with veiled faces. There, even there, the cherubim and seraphim adore before that selfsame throne to which our prayers ascend. And shall we come there with stunted requests and narrow, contracted faith?

Just as a candle cannot burn without fire, men cannot live without a spiritual life.

When you’re doing a film and the majority of the film is cast black, for me, it’s most important to get people to view those movies as just movies, as just good movies. At the end of the day, regardless of the color of the cast, we’re all doing the same thing in this business: trying to make a good film.

I am a sinner. This is the most accurate definition. It is not a figure of speech, a literary genre. I am a sinner.

I was called a terrorist yesterday, but when I came out of jail, many people embraced me, including my enemies, and that is what I normally tell other people who say those who are struggling for liberation in their country are terrorists.

God doesn’t love me any more or less because I had some work done on my face. You know, I prayed about it a long, long, long, long, long time, because there again, I wouldn’t want to do anything that I felt was going to be offensive to God.

In this world filled with challenges, we do need help from time to time. Religion, eternal truth, and our missionaries are vital parts of that help.

Game’s always been open arms with me.

To say that you can kill in the name of God is blasphemy.

Christians should never fail to sense the operation of an angelic glory. It forever eclipses the world of demonic powers, as the sun does a candle’s light.

It is not funny that anything else should fall down; only that a man should fall down. Why do we laugh? Because it is a gravely religious matter: it is the Fall of Man. Only man can be absurd: for only man can be dignified.

I’m actually an evangelical atheist, but there is something I recognise about religion: that it gives people a chance to surrender.

There are two kinds of people one can call reasonable: those who serve God with all their heart because they know him, and those who seek him with all their heart because they do not know him.

Religion is something left over from the infancy of our intelligence, it will fade away as we adopt reason and science as our guidelines.

The immigration issue is, I recognize, one that generates a lot of passion, but it does not make sense for us to want to push talent out.

We must accept finite disappointment, but never lose infinite hope.

Let us more and more insist on raising funds of love, of kindness, of understanding, of peace. Money will come if we seek first the Kingdom of God – the rest will be given.

My mother always taught us that if people don’t agree with you, the important thing is to listen to them. But if you’ve listened to them carefully and you still think that you’re right, then you must have the courage of your convictions.

I’m half-black, half-white, so I basically put it like this: I can fit in anywhere. That’s why I write so many stories from so many different perspectives, because I’ve seen so many.

I try to look on all the great things God’s done, and not focus on the negative. It’s a perspective.

Many people think of perfectionism as striving to be your best, but it is not about self-improvement; it’s about earning approval and acceptance.

For ninety per cent of those who view him from outside, the Christian God looks like a great landowner administering his estates, the world. Now this conventional picture, which is too well justified by appearances, corresponds in no way to the dogmatic basis or point of view of the Gospels.

In prayer it is better to have a heart without words than words without a heart.

We must show our Christian colors if we are to be true to Jesus Christ.

If ever I expected to come face to face with an angry Christian fundamentalist, it wasn’t in FAO Schwarz.

If you’re going to wake up early all the time, and you’re working hard, and you’re working out, sometimes you’re going to get tired. It’s OK. It’s acceptable – somewhat. We’re all human, unfortunately.

I cannot believe in a God who wants to be praised all the time.

Obedience brings success; exact obedience brings miracles.

Every once in a while, you let a word or phrase out and you want to catch it and bring it back. You can’t do that. It’s gone, gone forever.

No one but a fool is always right.

I know My God commands, whose power no power resists.

God is cruel. Sometimes he makes you live.

If you realize that all things change, there is nothing you will try to hold on to. If you are not afraid of dying, there is nothing you cannot achieve.

If you want to appeal to everyone, you can’t do a world tour and expect black people to show up at every date – when you’re in Australia, when you’re in Dubai, when you’re in Indonesia.

I don’t set out to write about spirituality; I am free to do something different every time.

If you have religious faith, very good, you can add on secular ethics, then religious belief, add on it, very good. But even those people who have no interest about religion, okay, it’s not religion, but you can train through education.

You can bear your own faults, and why not a fault in your wife?

The most eloquent prayer is the prayer through hands that heal and bless.

Together we must learn how to compose differences, not with arms, but with intellect and decent purpose.

I have some good friends of my own who happen to be gay, and when it comes to gay, straight, or whatever, I’m for anything life-affirmative. I’m for gay power, straight power, male power, female power; everybody should feel empowered without oppressing anyone who’s different.

God writes the Gospel not in the Bible alone, but also on trees, and in the flowers and clouds and stars.

If God did not exist, it would be necessary to invent Him.

Don’t cry because it’s over. Smile because it happened.

God has entrusted me with myself.

God and I have a great relationship, but we both see other people.

We can live without religion and meditation, but we cannot survive without human affection.

I believe that Catholics involved in politics carry the values of their religion within them, but have the mature awareness and expertise to implement them. The Church will never go beyond its task of expressing and disseminating its values, at least as long as I’m here.

Great indeed is the sublimity of the Creative, to which all beings owe their beginning and which permeates all heaven.

All major religious traditions carry basically the same message, that is love, compassion and forgiveness the important thing is they should be part of our daily lives.

To believe in God is impossible not to believe in Him is absurd.