This site is dedicated to the memory of Dr. Alan William Smolowe who gave birth to the creation of this database.
Susanne Langer, fully Susanne Katherina Langer née Knauth
As soon as religion becomes prosaic or perfunctory art appears somewhere else.
Carl Jung, fully Carl Gustav Jung
So long as religion is only faith and outward form, and the religious function is not experienced in our own souls, nothing of any importance has happened.
Helen Keller. aka Helen Adams Keller
Toleration… is the greatest gift of the mind; it requires the same effort of the brain that it takes to balance oneself on a bicycle.
Balance | Effort | Mind | Toleration |
The essence of religion is the human quest for salvation.
I believe that art is the only way by which an evil man can attain a realm of perfect liberation without becoming an entirely different person. While religion spurns evil men… art permits them to enter its realm, as long as they believe in it.
Ernest Kurtz and Katherine Ketcham
Forgiveness is not explanation… Explanations have to do with exploring causes, with digging down into the past in an effort to exert whatever control is still possible over the past. Forgiveness, on the other hand, has to do with letting go of the past – giving up the claim to control the past and refusing to be controlled by it. But forgiving is not the same thing as forgetting. “Letting go” of the past is not some kind of erasure; forgiveness is not an attempt to obliterate the past or wipe the slate clean… because the past is important, there can be no “unconditional forgiveness.”
Control | Effort | Forgiveness | Giving | Important | Past | Forgiveness |
Ronald Knox, fully Ronald Arbuthnott Knox
Whatever else it is - let us be clear about that from the outset - religion is something we belong to, not something which belongs to us; something that has got hold of us, not something we have got hold of.
Religion |
Karl Mannheim, alternatively Mannheim Károly
It is clearly untrue that we are automatically progressing and that the Churches and religion ought to hasten to adjust themselves to all the novelties of our age.
A religion would not be worth my adherence if I could live up to it perfectly.
The plainest historical evidence for the effectiveness of religion as a positive social form lies in the history of the Jews.
Nobody ought to be compelled in matters of religion either by law or force.
Religion is about fellowship and community… The task of religion is the maintenance and extension of human community.
Religion |
In war, as it is waged now, with the enormous losses on both sides, both sides will lose. It is a form of mutual suicide; and I believe that the entire effort of modern society should be concentrated on an endeavor to outlaw war as a method of the solution of problems between nations.
Effort | Method | Nations | Problems | Society | Suicide | War | Will | Society |
Religion, according to the Hindu, is not compounded of dogmas and creeds. Religion is a way of life in consonance with rationality and Truth. Truth is not and cannot be revealed once and for all - it must ever be a progressive revelation.
Life | Life | Rationality | Religion | Revelation | Truth |