Religion is the masterpiece of the art of animal training, for it trains people as to how they shall think.

In art, at a certain level, there is no ‚better than.‘ It’s just about trying to operate for yourself on the most supreme level, artistically, that you can and hoping that people get it.

Chance gives rise to thoughts, and chance removes them; no art can keep or acquire them.

Faith certainly tells us what the senses do not, but not the contrary of what they see; it is above, not against them.

What the Pope thinks of being gay does not matter to the world. It matters to the people who like the Pope and follow the Pope… It is not a reflection of all religious people.

A thing is not necessarily true because a man dies for it.

Art consists of limitation. The most beautiful part of every picture is the frame.

Music belongs to the people. To no one else. To no one else.

In art the best is good enough.

God to me is love.

The momentous thing in human life is the art of winning the soul to good or evil.

Whenever I go on a ride, I’m always thinking of what’s wrong with the thing and how it can be improved.

I wish I could make music about politics. I feel like it’s such an art and a talent that I admire tremendously, but when I step into the studio, I step out of the real world, and it’s therapeutic.

The art of living is more like wrestling than dancing.

Every philosophical problem, when it is subjected to the necessary analysis and justification, is found either to be not really philosophical at all, or else to be, in the sense in which we are using the word, logical.

Ritual will always mean throwing away something: destroying our corn or wine upon the altar of our gods.

It seemed like a very small possibility for me to become an artist. I didn’t have the need to be on the stage; I didn’t feel the need to be heard. I just needed to write.

Every man lives in two realms: the internal and the external. The internal is that realm of spiritual ends expressed in art, literature, morals, and religion. The external is that complex of devices, techniques, mechanisms, and instrumentalities by means of which we live.

One cannot really be a Catholic and grown up.

I’m a child of God first. Before I became a celebrity, I was baptized a Christian.

It’s not surprising, then, they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren’t like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations.

It’s one thing to be religious, but it’s another thing to make religion your policy.

Every people have gods to suit their circumstances.

Surrealism had a great effect on me because then I realised that the imagery in my mind wasn’t insanity. Surrealism to me is reality.

If you judge, investigate.

But for my faith in God, I should have been a raving maniac.

All ideologies are idiotic, whether religious or political, for it is conceptual thinking, the conceptual word, which has so unfortunately divided man.

Faith is easy; I think people complicate it.

Anyone who is to find Christ must first find the church. How could anyone know where Christ is and what faith is in him unless he knew where his believers are?

Religion is not going to come up with any new arguments.

I don’t think I’d ever apologise for music I make, no.

I was being trained because I wanted to be a preacher like my father. I wanted to talk about Moses; I wanted to talk about God… I wanted to talk about the apostles, the disciples and all that.

I always say that people should not rush to change religions. There is real value in finding the spiritual resources you need in your home religion.

No matter the nationality, no matter the religion, no matter the ethnic background, America brings out the best in people.

To see clearly is poetry, prophecy and religion all in one.

People do not like to think. If one thinks, one must reach conclusions. Conclusions are not always pleasant.

The dangers of not thinking clearly are much greater now than ever before. It’s not that there’s something new in our way of thinking – it’s that credulous and confused thinking can be much more lethal in ways it was never before.

We can’t solve problems by using the same kind of thinking we used when we created them.

Drawing is the honesty of the art. There is no possibility of cheating. It is either good or bad.

Religious organizations exist to foster the interests of persons subscribing to the same religious faith. Not so of for-profit corporations. Workers who sustain the operations of those corporations commonly are not drawn from one religious community.

I was born poor and without religion, under a happy sky, feeling harmony, not hostility, in nature. I began not by feeling torn, but in plenitude.

Man is a credulous animal, and must believe something; in the absence of good grounds for belief, he will be satisfied with bad ones.

Like a pianist runs her fingers over the keys, I’ll search my mind for what to say. Now, the poem may want you to write it. And then sometimes you see a situation and think, ‚I’d like to write about that.‘ Those are two different ways of being approached by a poem, or approaching a poem.

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

I have been very interested and intrigued and congratulatory toward President Bush and his paintings.

I gave in, and admitted that God was God.

Jesus never said a word about homosexuality. In all of his teachings about multiple things – he never said that gay people should be condemned. I personally think it is very fine for gay people to be married in civil ceremonies.

I’m born with a pencil in my hand. I did lots of sketching.

All of us should be on guard against beliefs that flatter ourselves. At the very least, we should check such beliefs against facts.

Acting is nothing more or less than playing. The idea is to humanize life.

Art is never finished, only abandoned.

We are so conformist; nobody is thinking. We are all sucking up stuff; we have been trained to be consumers, and we are all consuming far too much.

I don’t let my religious world get too complicated.

All who think cannot but see there is a sanction like that of religion which binds us in partnership in the serious work of the world.

The just is close to the people’s heart, but the merciful is close to the heart of God.

I know that the arts are important. I’m not denying that, but I can’t associate myself with all the claptrap that goes on around it.

Nothing fortifies scepticism more than the fact that there are some who are not sceptics; if all were so, they would be wrong.

What the world requires of the Christians is that they should continue to be Christians.

In art, the hand can never execute anything higher than the heart can imagine.

Theology is the effort to explain the unknowable in terms of the not worth knowing.

Men despise religion. They hate it and are afraid it may be true.