Lady Victoria Eclectic Pagan's blog: " What Some Famous People Have Said About Christianity"

It is no accident that the symbol of a bishop is a crook, and the sign of an archbishop is a double-cross.

Clergymen who publish pious frauds in the interest of the church are the orthodox liars of God.

The same means that have supported every other popular belief, have supported Christianity. War, imprisonment, assassination, and falsehood: deeds of unexampled and incomparable atrocity have made it what it is.

There is nothing more negative than the result of the critical study of the life of Jesus. The Jesus of Nazareth who came forward publicly as the Messiah, who preached the ethic of the kingdom of God, who founded the kingdom of God upon earth, and died to give his work its final consecration, never had any existence. His image has not been destroyed from without, it has fallen to pieces, cleft and disintegrated by the concrete historical problems which come to the surface one after another... He is a figure designed by rationalism, endowed with life by liberalism, and clothed by modern theology in a historical garb.

Christianity preaches only servitude and dependence. Its spirit is so favorable to tyranny that it always profits such a regime. True Christians are made to be slaves, and they know it and do not mind; this short life counts for too little in their eyes.

Those of us who believe in the right of any human being to belong to whatever church he sees fit, and to worship God in his own way, cannot be accused of prejudice when we do not want to see public education connected with religious control of the schools, which are paid for by taxpayers' money. Spiritual leadership should remain spiritual leadership and the temporal power should not become too important in any church.

Recently I was reading somewhere or other about an Italian curio-dealer who attempted to sell a 17th century crucifix to J.P. Morgan. Inside it was concealed a stiletto. What a perfect symbol of the Christian religion.

I call Christianity the one great curse, the one great intrinsic depravity, the one great instinct for revenge for which no expedient is sufficiently poisonous, secret, subterranean, petty-I call it the one mortal blemish of mankind. In Christianity neither morality nor religion come into contact with reality at any point. (Addressing anti-semitic Christians) You who hate the Jews so, why did you adopt their religion? One does well to put on gloves when reading the New Testament. The proximity of so much uncleanliness almost forces one to do this. Two great European narcotics, alcohol and Christianity. The Christian faith from the beginning, is sacrifice: the sacrifice of all freedom, all price, all self-confidence of spirit; it is at the same time subjection, self-derision, and self-mutilation... War to the death against depravity-depravity is Christianity. ... an absurd problem came to the surface: How COULD God permit that [crucifixion of Jesus Christ]!...the deranged reason of the little community found quite a frightfully absurd answer: God gave his Son for forgiveness, as a SACRIFICE...The SACRIFICE FOR GUILT, and just in its most repugnant and barbarous form-the sacrifice of the innocent for the sins of the guilty! What horrifying heathenism! The Christian resolution to find the world ugly and bad has made the world ugly and bad. Jesus died too soon. If he had lived to my age he would have repudiated his doctrine. One should not go into church if one wants to breathe pure air. The last Christian died on the cross. Christianity makes suffering contagious. A certain sense of cruelty towards oneself and others is Christian; hatred of those who think differently; the will to persecute. Mortal hostility against the masters of the earth, against the noble, that is also Christian. Hatred of mind, of pride, courage, freedom, libertinage of mind, is Christian; hatred of the sense, of the joy of the senses, of joy in general is Christian.

I couldn't but surmise that the devil, looking at the cruel wars that Christianity has occasioned, the persecutions, the tortures Christian has inflicted on Christian, the unkindness, the hypocracy, the intolerance, must consider the balance sheet with complacency. And when he remembers that it has laid upon mankind the bitter burden of the sense of sin that has darkened the beauty of the starry night and cast a baleful shadow on the passing plesures of a world to be enjoyed, he must chuckle as he murmurs: give the devil his due.

The church says the earth is flat, but I know that it is round, for I have seen the shadow on the moon, and I have more faith in a shadow than in the church.