Religious Tolerance Quotes

“If a believer demands that I, as a nonbeliever, observe his taboos in the public domain, he is not asking for my respect, but for my submission.”
― Flemming Rose

“I have a dream that one day this nation will rise up and live out the true meaning of its creed: 'We hold these truths to be self-evident, that all men are created equal.”
― Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.

“God has made different religions to suit different aspirants, times, and countries. All doctrines are only so many paths; but a path is by no means God himself. Indeed, one can reach God if one follows any of the paths with whole-hearted devotion...One may eat a cake with icing either straight or sidewise. It will taste sweet either way.”
― Sri Ramakrishna, Gospel of Sri Ramakrishna

“Christians believe that God came amongst us as a man, do they not? Yet the Muselmen say he was only a prophet, and that God has no name...We fight and kill each other so readily, yet if I had been born in the East, would I not believe the stories they believe, and if they had been born here, would they not be Christians?”
― David Clement-Davies, Fell

“Tim looked my way again. "And how to you think you will be judged, on the day the trumpet sounds? You who have caused so much pain, so many deaths."
"I have been true to Him. I have stood up for His name when all around me ---"
"For His name," Tim said. "But what of what He taught? What of the innocents you have killed in His name?"
"I've only known one miraculous innocent," Father Peter said.
"And you've spent your lifetimes trying to atone for your betrayal, to protect his memory. A memory that doesn't need your protection."
"You're not going to change my mind."
"I know," Tim said. His voice was sad.”
― Robert J. Wiersema

“Hurt no one's belief as long as they are not practicing and preaching hate.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Earthquakin' Egalitarian: I Die Everyday So Your Children Can Live

“atheist: (n.) one who dislikes people who believe in God.”
― Sol Luckman, The Angel's Dictionary

“The greatest threat to the world is not any specific faith, for faith is nature's anti-dote to misery. The greatest threat to the world is intolerance, regardless of its religious, non-religious, political or intellectual background.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Aşkanjali: The Sufi Sermon

“Without love nobody's human, no matter our faith.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Handcrafted Humanity: 100 Sonnets For A Blunderful World

“Muslim not terrorist.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Handcrafted Humanity: 100 Sonnets For A Blunderful World

“No matter what we call water, it quenches everybody's thirst equally. I accept all religions to be true and equal, for what matters is our common humanity.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Handcrafted Humanity: 100 Sonnets For A Blunderful World

“Sonnet of Intolerance

Intolerance and religion don't go together,
If they do, you are a far cry from being religious.
Intolerance and science don't go together,
If they do, such science is just modern hogwash.
Intolerance and philosophy don't go together,
If they do, you are a dickhearted intellectualist.
Intolerance and humanism don't go together,
If they do, you are a far cry from being humanist.
Intolerance and intellect don't go together,
If they do, such intellect is all blade, no handle.
Intolerance and wisdom don't go together,
If they do, you are but a sophisticated vandal.
Anything that is civilized helps abolish intolerance,
If it doesn't, it is yet another prehistoric nuisance.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Handcrafted Humanity: 100 Sonnets For A Blunderful World

“Not all christians are loving, but anyone who is loving is a christian. Not all jews are just, but anyone who is just is a jew. Not all buddhists are compassionate, but anyone who is compassionate is a buddhist. Not all muslims are peace-loving, but anyone who is peace-loving is a muslim. Not all hindus are advaita or nonsectarian, but anyone who is nonsectarian is a hindu. Not all humanists are accountable, but anyone who is accountable is a humanist. Our religious identity says nothing about our character, but our behavior towards others says it all.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Either Reformist or Terrorist: If You Are Terror I Am Your Grandfather

“I am a victim of religious persecution, and this tragedy has changed my life forever. Anything I write about freedom of religion is therefore colored by what has happened to me—a nightmare that never ends.”
― Qamar Rafiq

“What is the matter with this world? From Afghanistan to India and Pakistan to Myanmar, we have witnessed the testimonies of tainted religious freedom, endangered democratic norms, and fractured human rights values.”
― Qamar Rafiq

“But the genuine tragedy remains that religious freedom is in deep crisis, and neither the governments nor faith leaders have the total answer to this frightening mess.”
― Qamar Rafiq

“Every peacemaker is muslim, every lover is christian, every helper is buddhist.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Divane Dynamite: Only truth in the cosmos is love

“Yes, I want to convert the world,
I want to convert all cussing into hugging.
Yes, I want to convert the people, all of them,
I want to convert mindless mocking into mending.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Divane Dynamite: Only truth in the cosmos is love

“Religious identity has become a brand factor in Pakistan that determines which citizens are more equal than others in terms of status, opportunities and rights”
― Qamar Rafiq

“Integration of religions is the greatest religion.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Mukemmel Musalman: Kafir Biraz, Peygamber Biraz

“Personal fiction is a psychological necessity of the individual – hence, a right - why can't we simply accept it as such! Why do we have to diss another person for not believing in the same kind of fiction that we believe in! It is time we become an aid to each other's light, not an impediment.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Himalayan Sonneteer: 100 Sonnets of Unsubmission

“Rahmat is an act of azan,
Rahmat is what makes us holy.
When Rahmat and Azan manifest as one,
That's the beginning of Ramazan,
Christmas and Deepavali.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Vande Vasudhaivam: 100 Sonnets for Our Planetary Pueblo

“Goodness is universal,
vessels may vary.
Some call it water,
some agua, some pani.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Mukemmel Musalman: Kafir Biraz, Peygamber Biraz

“Militant atheism is just another intolerance - if you don't get this, you are just as retarded as the religious fundamentalists. Religious fundamentalism is just another sacrilege - if you don't get this, you are just as infidel as militant atheists.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Visvavictor: Kanima Akiyor Kainat

“To sum up, we may say that, according to its own understanding of itself, Christianity stands at one and the same time in both a positive and a negative relation to the religions of the world: it recognizes itself as being linked with them in the unity of the concept of a covenant relationship and lives out of the conviction that the cosmos and its myth, just like history and its mystery, speak of God and can lead men to God; but it is equally aware of a decided No to other religions and sees in them a means by which man seeks to shield himself from God instead of leaving himself open to his demands.”
― Pope Benedict XVI, Truth and Tolerance: Christian Belief and World Religions

“The ideal of religious tolerance has morphed into the straightjacket of religious agreement.”
― Stephen Prothero, God Is Not One: The Eight Rival Religions That Run the World--and Why Their Differences Matter

“Yet idolatry is condemned! Why? Nobody knows. Because some hundreds of years ago some man of Jewish blood happened to condemn it? That is, he happened to condemn everybody else's idols except his own. If God is represented in any beautiful form or any symbolic form, said the Jew, it is awfully bad; it is sin. But if He is represented in the form of a chest, with two angels sitting on each side, and a cloud hanging over it, it is the holy of holies. If God comes in the form of a dove, it is holy. But if He comes in the form of a cow, it is heathen superstition; condemn it! That is how the world goes. That is why the poet says, "What fools we mortals be!" How difficult it is to look through each other's eyes, and that is the bane of humanity. That is the basis of hatred and jealousy, of quarrel and of fight.”
― Swami Vivekananda, Complete Works of Swami Vivekananda, 9 Vols.

“Many fervor, many faiths.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Vande Vasudhaivam: 100 Sonnets for Our Planetary Pueblo

“Till we end militant atheism, there is no Humanism.”
― Abhijit Naskar, Visvavatan: 100 Demilitarization Sonnets

“Ashoka's political and moral philosophy, as he expressed it in his imperial inscriptions, initiated a tradition of religious tolerance, non-violent debate and a commitment to the idea of happiness which has animated Indian political philosophy ever since. But - and it's a big but - his benevolent empire scarcely outlived him. And that leaves us with the uncomfortable question of whether such high ideals can survive the realities of political power. Nevertheless, this was a ruler who really did change the way that his subjects and their successors thought.”
― Neil MacGregor, A History of the World in 100 Objects