QUOTES
A
major function of fundamentalist religion is to bolster deeply insecure and fearful
people. This is done by justifying a way of life with all of its defining prejudices.
It thereby provides an appropriate and legitimate outlet for one's anger. The
authority of an inerrant Bible that can be readily quoted to buttress this point
of view becomes an essential ingredient to such a life. When that Bible is challenged,
or relativized, the resulting anger proves the point categorically.
I
could not believe that anyone who has read this book would be so foolish as to
proclaim that the Bible in every literal word was the divinely inspired, inerrant
word of God. Have these people simply not read the text? Are they hopelessly misinformed?
Is there a different Bible? Are they blinded by a combination of ego needs and
naivete?
All
human beings bear God's image and must be respected for what each person is. Therefore,
no external description of one's being, whether based on race, ethnicity, gender
or sexual orientation, can properly be used as the basis for either rejection
or discrimination.
'The
heart will never respond to that which the mind rejects.
