Outreach & Events

“The political climate in our house was generally and loosely left: it was unthinkable that a Jew, our sort of Jew, the artisan Jewish worker, self-employed, poor, Yiddish-speaking, unassimilated, non-religious, could be anything but socialistic.”

“ . . . although my father had been raised a Muslim, by the time he met my mother he was a confirmed atheist, thinking religion to be so much superstition.”

“I have managed most of my life to exclude religious speculation from my mode of thought. I've found that, on the whole, it adds very little to economics.”

“Dr. Veblen has answered my letter concerning his attitude toward Christianity. He was asked to express himself with reference to the Bible, the divinity of Jesus, redemption, and the interpretation of the Scriptures by the Lutheran church. He answers about as follows: The historical content of the Bible must naturally submit to the same criticism as all other historical material, without prejudice to scholarship. No one could be more interested in this than the student of social life. With reference to the divinity of Jesus, he agrees with what Jesus himself has said in the so-called synoptical gospels, and all later theories should go back to them for proof. Concerning redemption, he cannot believe that Jesus has atoned for the world, nor that the theory to the effect that Christ is the world's proxy is correct, and he believes that these gospels can be interpreted in a more liberal fashion.”

“Science is the great antidote to the poison of enthusiasm and superstition.”

“Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the feelings of a heartless world, just as it is the spirit of unspiritual conditions. It is the opium of the people.”

“The first requisite of the happiness of the people is the abolition of religion.”