Israel Morrow > Quotes

“Fear and superstition were not the tools of witches but rather the tools of those who persecuted them.”
― Israel Morrow, Gods of the Flesh: A Skeptic's Journey Through Sex, Politics and Religion

“Native peoples do not look for salvation from worlds beyond. They need no alternate reality, because the mortal world and the spirit world are the same. This Earth is heaven, hell and purgatory; but most importantly, it is home. The greatest of spiritual mysteries may be revealed just beyond the front door, in the life of a community.”
― Israel Morrow, Gods of the Flesh: A Skeptic's Journey Through Sex, Politics and Religion

“If the Constitution doesn’t say anything about a woman’s right to abortion, I’m damn sure it doesn’t say anything about the rights of the unborn.”
― Israel Morrow, Gods of the Flesh: A Skeptic's Journey Through Sex, Politics and Religion

“I firmly believe that American society would not endure ten years if subjected to half the trials and tortures we’ve put Natives through. And yet Native peoples have not been utterly destroyed, not by the world’s strongest military. They have not been totally assimilated, not by the world’s largest religion. Native religions are indeed concerned with being a good person, respecting one’s family, ancestors, community, and the Earth—and when these principles are lived, there is great strength.”
― Israel Morrow, Gods of the Flesh: A Skeptic's Journey Through Sex, Politics and Religion

“Sherrie described atheism as a positive system of belief—one based on data, exploration and observation rather than scripture, creed and prayer. Atheists believe that human life is a chemical phenomenon, that our first parents were super-novas that happened billions of years ago—that humans are inexplicable miracles in a universe of structured chaos. Atheists believe that when we die, we will turn into organic debris which will continue cycling for billions of years in various incarnations.
Sherrie explained that atheists appreciate life unfathomably because it is going to end. No one who takes atheism seriously dies without hope.”
― Israel Morrow, Gods of the Flesh: A Skeptic's Journey Through Sex, Politics and Religion

“The worst lie ever told is that it is easier to destroy than to create. This lie makes people apathetic about a number of imminently avoidable horrors, particularly the nuclear ones. But Oppenheimer didn’t just go outside one day and trip over an atomic bomb. Nuclear development required trillions of dollars and a massive sustained effort by America’s top politicians, military advisors, and scientific geniuses. Not one damn bit of it was easy. It was certainly harder that sitting down with Stalin or Khrushchev and having a talk . . .
America had options. The path of destruction was a choice. It has always been America’s choice, and we citizens have always shrugged, assuming it’s too late to turn back the doomsday clock, although we’re the ones who wound it in the first place.”
― Israel Morrow, Gods of the Flesh: A Skeptic's Journey Through Sex, Politics and Religion

“Meditation isn’t what most people think,’ she said. ‘You’re meditating right now, in the way that you’re focused on what I’m saying. If your mind was somewhere else—if you were thinking about the Saints game or what you might have for dessert—that’s not meditation. You have to be here, now. Inhabit the present moment, because that’s the only way to find lasting happiness. If you think happiness is somewhere out there, you’ll spend your whole life chasing it, and once you find something that looks like happiness, it will change without warning. You have to accept yourself as you are, happy to be breathing, to be present in this moment.”
― Israel Morrow, Gods of the Flesh: A Skeptic's Journey Through Sex, Politics and Religion

“People don't hate other people because they're different. They hate themselves because they're weak, and they take it out on those who are powerless.”
― Israel Morrow, Gods of the Flesh: A Skeptic's Journey Through Sex, Politics and Religion

“In Africa every human has a spark of divine nature, and sin does not separate us from it. We are cousins of God. Every person has multiple souls, including the souls of ancestors that reincarnate through us. The purest soul is called an ori, and a person who cultivates their ori can attain divinity.”
― Israel Morrow, Gods of the Flesh: A Skeptic's Journey Through Sex, Politics and Religion

“Today, there are very few unicorns left, and not many witches or wizards. But there is always magic—the power to create sufficient conditions for spirits to manifest, to bring consciousness from the realms of potential into the world of action.”
― Israel Morrow, Gods of the Flesh: A Skeptic's Journey Through Sex, Politics and Religion

“Situation, reason, sympathy and consequence are the only equations of morality that hold water.”
― Israel Morrow, Gods of the Flesh: A Skeptic's Journey Through Sex, Politics and Religion

“In West African traditions, land belongs to the person who works it. Produce belongs to the person who grows it. Whatever is created belongs to the creators—not to the God that created them, and certainly not to the colonist or slavemaster.”
― Israel Morrow, Gods of the Flesh: A Skeptic's Journey Through Sex, Politics and Religion

“Women facing sexual violence rarely speak up or call the police because they know what awaits them. Even good men hate it when women express their feelings, often responding with mockery, insults or threats. There’s a box in the minds of American men, a box labeled 'Girl Problems,' into which men can stuff any complaint made by women they wish to ignore.”
― Israel Morrow, Gods of the Flesh: A Skeptic's Journey Through Sex, Politics and Religion

“A religion which supplies only mercy and forgiveness must create demand through systems of oppression. The genius of Christianity is that it caters to opposite extremes--the oppressed who demands mercy and the oppressor who demands forgiveness.”
― Israel Morrow

“To dismantle Christianity, one must defy thousands of years of hymns and candles, nativity sets, Madonnas and stained glass windows; prayers, lectures, movies and novels; speeches on battlefields, our Western worldview and the way we see ourselves as individuals. Christianity is a culture, both transcending and inextricably linked with Western culture. One does not simply disprove a culture. The only way to stop this train is to stop buying tickets. To do that, we need better modes of transportation and better destinations. Sherrie was the first to show me another spiritual country, accessible by starship or quantum teleporter—beautiful atheisms, formed when individuals embrace the wildness of an enigmatic, indifferent universe and dare to live compassionately.”
― Israel Morrow, Gods of the Flesh: A Skeptic's Journey Through Sex, Politics and Religion

“I firmly disagree with anyone who says humans are the most advanced, or the most intelligent species on the planet. In fact, only three animals have ever threatened to kill me: humans, their dogs, and a particularly aggressive species of house spider.”
― Israel Morrow, Gods of the Flesh: A Skeptic's Journey Through Sex, Politics and Religion

“Civil disobedience—or rather, spiritual disobedience—is not an Abrahamic idea. It is fundamental to being human.”
― Israel Morrow, Gods of the Flesh: A Skeptic's Journey Through Sex, Politics and Religion

“Man is condemned to be free; because once thrown into the world, he is responsible for everything that he does.”
― Israel Morrow, Gods of the Flesh: A Skeptic's Journey Through Sex, Politics and Religion

“One popular defense of the Founding Fathers says they were simply men of their time, flawed idealists for whom 'that was the culture then.' But in fact, they were not men of their time. The Founding Fathers were men of their color (white) of their status (wealthy) of their descent (European) of their time.
To say that the Founding Fathers were men of their time defines time according to them. It legitimizes their place at the top of the world--the origin of popular history--even if the leaders of other nations were more democratic and fair-handed.”
― Israel Morrow, Gods of the Flesh: A Skeptic's Journey Through Sex, Politics and Religion

“We’ve all heard that women tolerate sex to get relationships, while men tolerate relationships to get sex. That is simply not true—but there is something truly chilling about the fact that most Americans believe it’s true and use this formula as a guide for behavior.”
― Israel Morrow, Gods of the Flesh: A Skeptic's Journey Through Sex, Politics and Religion

“When dealing with trauma, one cannot simply move on without knowing where to go. You have to choose a destination, choose your destiny—and move forward.”
― Israel Morrow, Gods of the Flesh: A Skeptic's Journey Through Sex, Politics and Religion

“Art is the vehicle for describing and inventing truths that science and mathematics haven’t caught up with.”
― Israel Morrow, Gods of the Flesh: A Skeptic's Journey Through Sex, Politics and Religion

“We must understand that suffering is not a virtue. On an evolutionary scale, pain exists as a warning mechanism. Pain means stop if you want to survive.”
― Israel Morrow, Gods of the Flesh: A Skeptic's Journey Through Sex, Politics and Religion

“When we are born, our variables are unwritten. Ethics are among the most important variables which each person writes for themselves. We must be careful not to accept any pre-formed ethical system as proven; instead, we must engage with systems through study and experimentation, which Buddha called “direct experience.”
― Israel Morrow, Gods of the Flesh: A Skeptic's Journey Through Sex, Politics and Religion

“the Church demonizes whatever it can’t assimilate.”
― Israel Morrow, Gods of the Flesh: A Skeptic's Journey Through Sex, Politics and Religion

“We hate political uncertainty more than we hate bad leadership”
― Israel Morrow, Gods of the Flesh: A Skeptic's Journey Through Sex, Politics and Religion

“Jesus commanded, 'Take up your cross and follow me.' That doesn't accord well with an evening spent on the therapist's couch.
Americans do not ask for help--physically or psychologically--because the more we suffer, the more we are convinced we're doing the right thing. When our words and actions are hated, we think we must be speaking the truth. 'For thus they persecuted the prophets.”
― Israel Morrow, Gods of the Flesh: A Skeptic's Journey Through Sex, Politics and Religion

“That is how we solve ourselves, how we write the variables of the equation. Self-determination is the means by which we create a meaning for our existence. And self-determination, the basic exercise of freedom, is not possible alone. We define ourselves—and discover ourselves—not simply in relation to others but in relationship with others, and with our world. How could you be the greatest Pokémon master in a world with no Pokémon?”
― Israel Morrow, Gods of the Flesh: A Skeptic's Journey Through Sex, Politics and Religion

“People do need grace, but grace is not always what we think. The outpouring of the Holy Spirit I witnessed in my youth—from summer camps to national conferences with hymns sung by choirs of thousands—strikes me today as a very human experience. The energy of a crowd, the trust of a friend, the touch that sends thrills up your spine and shakes you to the core, the joy of giving and the honor of receiving, the dance and the competition, the humbling and the uplifting, the brightest ecstasy and the firmest faith—these things do not rain from Heaven but well up from the Earth.
We spread blessings with our hands and pour out grace with our mouths. We love and we deserve love. We have a right to ask for love from our partners, friends, families, and strangers. And we have a right to seek love in the most intimate, personal experiences.”
― Israel Morrow, Gods of the Flesh: A Skeptic's Journey Through Sex, Politics and Religion

“When conditions are sufficient, the thing manifests, and when they are not sufficient, the thing remains hidden.”
― Israel Morrow, Gods of the Flesh: A Skeptic's Journey Through Sex, Politics and Religion