Bertrand Russell Quotes About Church

• I say quite deliberately that the Christian religion, as organized in its Churches, has been and still is the principal enemy of moral progress in the world.

  Bertrand Russell

  Death, Christian, Atheist

  Bertrand Russell (1957). “Why I Am Not a Christian: And Other Essays on Religion and Related Subjects”, p.21, Simon and Schuster

• You find as you look around the world that every single bit of progress in humane feeling, every improvement in the criminal law, every step toward the diminution of war, every step toward better treatment of the colored races, or every mitigation of slavery, every moral progress that there has been in the world, has been consistently opposed by the organized churches of the world. I say quite deliberately that the christian religion, as organized in its churches, has been and still is the principle enemy of moral progress in the world.

  Bertrand Russell

  Christian, War, Race

  Bertrand Russell, Robert Edward Egner (1961). “The basic writings of Bertrand Russell, 1903-1959”

• If the Church is not now as bad as the Soviet Government, that is due to the influence of those who attacked the Church

  Bertrand Russell

  Government, Church, Influence

  Bertrand Russell, Andrew G. Bone (2003). “Man's Peril, 1954-55”, p.216, Psychology Press

• Fear is the parent of cruelty, and therefore it is no wonder if cruelty and religion have gone hand-in-hand. It is because fear is at the basis of those two things. In this world we can now begin a little to understand things, and a little to master them by the help of science, which has forced its way step by step against the Christian religion, against the churches, and against the opposition of all the old precepts.

  Bertrand Russell

  Christian, Hands, Two

  Bertrand Russell (1957). “Why I Am Not a Christian: And Other Essays on Religion and Related Subjects”, p.22, Simon and Schuster

• When it was first proposed to establish laboratories at Cambridge, Todhunter, the mathematician, objected that it was unnecessary for students to see experiments performed, since the results could be vouched for by their teachers, all of them of the highest character, and many of them clergymen of the Church of England.

  Bertrand Russell

  Teacher, Character, Science

  Bertrand Russell (1992). “The Basic Writings of Bertrand Russell, 1903-1959”, p.620, Psychology Press

• It is odd that neither the Church nor modern public opinion condemns petting, provided it stops short at a certain point. At what point sin begins is a matter as to which casuists differ. One eminently orthodox Catholic divine laid it down that a confessor may fondle a nun's breasts, provided he does it without evil intent. But I doubt whether modern authorities would agree with him on this point.

  Bertrand Russell

  Evil, Catholic, Doubt

  Bertrand Russell (2009). “Unpopular Essays”, p.77, Routledge

• If throughout your life you abstain from murder, theft, fornication, perjury, blasphemy, and disrespect toward your parents, church, and your king, you are conventionally held to deserve moral admiration even if you have never done a single kind, generous or useful action. This very inadequate notion of virtue is an outcome of taboo morality, and has done untold harm.

  Bertrand Russell

  Kings, Parent, Disrespect

  Bertrand Russell (2009). “Human Society in Ethics and Politics”, p.27, Routledge

• The Church no longer contends that knowledge is in itself sinful, though it did so in its palmy days; but the acquisition of knowledge, even though not sinful, is dangerous, since it may lead to pride of intellect, and hence to a questioning of the Christian dogma.

  Bertrand Russell

  Christian, Pride, Church

  Bertrand Russell (1957). “Why I Am Not a Christian: And Other Essays on Religion and Related Subjects”, p.45, Simon and Schuster

• The first effect of emancipation from the Church was not to make men think rationally, but to open their minds to every sort of antique nonsense

  Bertrand Russell

  Men, Thinking, Mind

  Bertrand Russell (2013). “History of Western Philosophy: Collectors Edition”, Routledge

• We are told that Sin consists in acting contrary to God's commands, but we are also told that God is omnipotent. . . . This leads to frightful results. . . . The British State considers it the duty of an Englishman to kill people who are not English whenever a collection of elderly gentlemen in Westminster tells him to do so. . . . Church and State are placable enemies of both intelligence and virtue.

  Bertrand Russell

  Elderly, People, Gentleman

• [The church] is in its major part an opponent still of progress and improvement in all the ways that diminish suffering in the world, because it has chosen to label as morality a certain narrow set of rules of conduct which have nothing to do with human happiness; and when you say that this or that ought to be done because it would make for human happiness, they think that has nothing to do with the matter at all. "What has human happiness to do with morals? The object of morals is not to make people happy.

  Bertrand Russell

  Thinking, People, Suffering

  Bertrand Russell (2016). “Why I Am Not a Christian”, p.18, Lulu Press, Inc

• One who believes, as I do, that the free intellect is the chief engine of human progress, cannot but be fundamentally opposed to Bolshevism, as much as to the Church of Rome.

  Bertrand Russell

  Believe, Rome, Progress

  Bertrand Russell, Richard A. Rempel, Beryl Haslam (2000). “Uncertain Paths to Freedom: Russia and China, 1919-22”, p.197, Psychology Press

• We may say, in a broad way, that Greek philosophy down to Aristotle expresses the mentality appropriate to the City State; that Stoicism is appropriate to a cosmopolitan despotism; that stochastic philosophy is an intellectual expression of the Church as an organization; that philosophy since Descartes, or at any rate since Locke, tends to embody the prejudices of the commercial middle class; and that Marxism and Fascism are the philosophies appropriate to the modern industrial state.

  Bertrand Russell

  Philosophy, Expression, Class

• Neither the Church nor modern public opinion condemns petting, provided it stops short at a certain point.

  Bertrand Russell

  Church, Public Opinion, Modern

  Bertrand Russell (2009). “Unpopular Essays”, p.80, Routledge

• The desire for legitimate offspring is, in fact, according to the Catholic Church, the only motive which can justify sexual intercourse.

  Bertrand Russell

  Catholic, Church, Desire

  Bertrand Russell (2014). “Bertrand Russell's Best”, p.43, Routledge

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