I'm a great admirer of secularism. At its best, I think it's one of the best things that we have. I don't believe in insinuating religion into conversation. I don't believe in excluding it from conversation. I enjoy the fact that people's innermost thoughts are their own.

Marilynne Robinson

But the West is trying to weaken Islam from outside and inside. They attack our people and invade our countries from outside, and they weaken us from within with ideas like secularism, liberalism and democracy. This is all designed to contaminate our pure Islam.

Abu Bakar Bashir

Design Yin Within

Secularism will not work in Egypt any more than theocracy. What will work is governance that is guided by the Islamic values of the majority with protection of the minority rights.

Ahmed Zewail

Work Wit Will

Secularism has no central goal, it's just promoting endless relativism. That's why there is a huge moral drift in the country. Everybody is infallible except the Pope, if you like.

Ann Widdecombe

You Why Very

What I do not like is militant secularism, whereby anything is acceptable as long as it's not Christian.

Ann Widdecombe

Where Thing Thin

Russian President Vladimir Putin's traditionalist-nationalist rhetoric, which blames secularism, diversity and internationalism for the weakening of Western democracies, gives voice to the grievances that American hate groups have felt for so long.

Asha Rangappa

Which Western West

Let no one challenge India's secularism.

Atal Bihari Vajpayee

T Secularism Secular

The Obamacare contraception mandate was never about freedom. It was always about pitting secularism against religion, and using the power of government to sponsor secularism.

Ben Shapiro

Religion Power Men

It's no secret that in New York during the last 30 years there has been a tragic exodus from the churches into materialism, secularism and humanism.

Billy Graham

York Years Year

Unhappy, let alone angry, religious people provide more persuasive arguments for atheism and secularism than do all the arguments of atheists.

Dennis Prager

Men Alone Us

The great American tradition is one of pluralism, not exclusive secularism. The strength of our country is reflected in the contributions that we all make to the common good.

Donald Wuerl

Strength Great Good

One of the challenges of secularism is that it's not something outside us. In too many instances, secularism has so permeated the church that sometimes it's the frame of reference even for very good people, people who have a strong allegiance to the church.

Donald Wuerl

Time Good Who

The struggle of democratic secularism, religious tolerance, individual freedom and feminism against authoritarian patriarchal religion, culture and morality is going on all over the world - including the Islamic world, where dissidents are regularly jailed, killed, exiled or merely intimidated and silenced.

Ellen Willis

Religion Freedom World

I have said time and again that the republican order, and secularism, when executed perfectly, are blessings from God.

Fethullah Gulen

Time God Tim

I believe that pluralistic secularism, in the long run, is a more deadly poison than straightforward persecution.

Francis Schaeffer

War UN Than

I want the French people to respect values that allow each individual to practice his or her faith, but in the frame of our common rules of secularism.

Francois Hollande

Respect Faith Want

In the public realm, secularism should not concede a single inch to religious intrusions. To argue otherwise is to violate the meaning of secularism.

Gad Saad

Wise Violate Viola

In the public realm, secularism should not concede a single inch to religious intrusions.

Gad Saad

Us T Single

Secularism and pluralism are two of the defining ethos of Western societies. The former decouples religion from governmental institutions whilst the latter seeks to protect the rights of all citizens to freely practice their creed.

Gad Saad

Religion Men Government

Catholics and evangelicals need to remain allied, and in solidarity, against the increasingly aggressive secularism of our age.

Gary Bauer

Age Van T

Bad Religion has never been about criticizing people who are Christian. But we've always been about pointing out the irony and contradictions in Christian theology and the more extreme versions of Christians that seek to challenge modern secularism.

Greg Graffin

Religion Who Ways

Secularism does not accept many things as absolutes. Its principal objectives are pleasure and self-interest. Often, those who embrace secularism have a different look about them.

James E. Faust

I solemnly declare that this spiritual kingdom of faith will move forward with or without each of us individually. No unhallowed hand can stay the growth of the Church nor prevent fulfillment of its mission. Any of us can be left behind, drawn away by the seductive voices of secularism and materialism.

James E. Faust

Perhaps more than ever before, there is that aggressive secularism and there are those who would indeed try to destroy our Christian heritage and culture and take God from the public square. Religion must not be taken from the public square.

Keith O'Brien

To imply that religious believers have no right to engage moral questions in the public square or at the ballot is simply to establish a Reichian secularism as our state faith.

Maggie Gallagher

Unity and secularism will be the motto of the government. We can't afford divisive polity in India.

Manmohan Singh

I'm a great admirer of secularism. At its best, I think it's one of the best things that we have. I don't believe in insinuating religion into conversation. I don't believe in excluding it from conversation. I enjoy the fact that people's innermost thoughts are their own.

Marilynne Robinson

There are some who believe that secularism and Islam are not compatible. But Muslims should show everyone that this is not the case. It's up to them to show that you can be French and Muslim and still respect secular rules.

Marine Le Pen

Without a policy restricting immigration, it becomes difficult, if not impossible, to fight against communalism and the rise of ways of life at odds with laicite - France's distinctive form of secularism - and other laws and values of the French Republic.

Marine Le Pen

Crucially, Marxist atheism is only achieved once the theological critique of capitalism is completed. This is what separates Marxist atheism from the gliberal platitudes of the likes of Nick Cohen, who proclaim secularism while remaining attached to the theology of capital (liberal commonsense).

Mark Fisher

It seems true that the growth of science and secularism made organized Christianity feel under threat.

Mary Douglas

As a supporter of secularism, I am willing to accept same-sex weddings in a state-sanctioned register office, on grounds of equity. As a believer in Islam, however, I insist that no mosque be forced to hold one against its wishes.

Mehdi Hasan

I am a sworn atheist and therefore from my point of view the Talmud or the Koran don't constitute works of political philosophy but rather writings that stand in utter contradiction to concepts like logic, freedom, feminism, secularism, brotherhood - which are my ideals.

Michel Onfray

How can a child adhere to school and the notion of secularism when they see their mother rejected from a school outing, stigmatized, left on the sidelines, just because she has a scarf on her head?

Najat Vallaud-Belkacem

Some Muslim students experience secularism as an act of aggression.

Najat Vallaud-Belkacem

We have to reappropriate the concept of laicite (secularism) so we can explain to our young pupils that whatever their faith, they belong to this idea, and they're not excluded. Secularism is not something against them; it protects them.

Najat Vallaud-Belkacem

If a big number of young pupils felt secularism was an attack on them, it was because the term had been misused and deformed in the public debate for years by the extreme-right and the right as an attack on Islam. The term had often been misused to point out how Muslims were different to others, and that is clearly problematic.

Najat Vallaud-Belkacem

We have to be careful not to have a form of militant secularism in our country, which is counter-productive for children we would like to see - adhere - to secularism.

Najat Vallaud-Belkacem

For me, my secularism is, India first. I say, the philosophy of my party is 'Justice to all. Appeasement to none.' This is our secularism.

Narendra Modi

No Muslim country has ever done as much as Turkey to make itself over in the image of a European nation-state; the country's westernised elite brutally imposed secularism, among other things, on its devout population of peasants.

Pankaj Mishra

It's clear that the RSS is directly taking key decisions on behalf of the BJP. RSS policies are not compliant with our country's interests. The RSS doesn't accept secularism.

Pinarayi Vijayan

Anyone leaving the Congress' camp and joining - or even indirectly praising - the BJP-led NDA coalition immediately stands the risk of losing this Congress-issued certificate of secularism. It is a travesty!

Piyush Goyal

The fact remains that secularism is inherent in the Indian system, in the Indian ethos and culture. India cannot but be secular.

Pranab Mukherjee

It is true that the battle for secularism must be fought in the hearts and minds of people, but how does one reach out to the hearts and minds in a fascist state?

Prashant Bhushan

'Secularism' is the most misused word in the country. Its misuse should come to an end.

Rajnath Singh

French laicite is probably aggressive and antagonistic to the religion, but there are other models of secularism in the world where there could be reconciliation between religion and secularism.

Rashid al-Ghannushi

Secularism is categorically not saying that the religious may not speak out publicly or have a say in public life. It is about saying that religion alone should not confer a privileged say in public life, or greater influence on it. It really is as simple as that.

Richard Dawkins

Needless to say, oftentimes a 'religion' is not needed to breed extremism. People breed it all by themselves, oftentimes with the subjective morality of modern secularism breeding the worst kind.

Steven Crowder

Northeastern and most coastal states will vote for the candidate who is more closely aligned with international cooperation and engagement, secularism and science, gun control, individual freedom in culture and sexuality, and a greater role for the government in protecting the environment and ensuring economic equality.

Steven Pinker

Secularism is intact because of Hindus.

Yogi Adityanath