I took religion much too seriously however and its overall effect was depressing. I would have really liked to discard it but somehow I couldn't.

There was a time when someone would get on a plane and request to move their seat just because the person sitting next to them was of a different ethnicity or religion or nationality. But I don't think my generation wants that. That's how it used to be.

It is an interesting and demonstrable fact that all children are atheists and were religion not inculcated into their minds they would remain so.

Jesus claimed He had the power to raise himself from the dead and His followers would be raised from the dead. That's a unique claim in the literature of religion.

There are a lot of Grinches out there that would like nothing better than to take any references to religion out of the holiday season.

Most people I know are not hard-core religious people. They are what I would call 'lightly religious.' So I don't buy the notion that we can't laugh about religion in America.

Well right now I'm very fascinated with 1920s Berlin. I mean probably the more interesting thing would be to go to the beginning of civilization or precivilization - like polytheistic times. It would be interesting to see what came before modern religion and culture - what circumstances created the environment or the need for it.

I was 21 in 1968 so I'm as much a child of the '60s as is possible to be. In those years the subject of religion had really almost disappeared the idea that religion was going to be a major force in the life of our societies in the West anyway would have seemed absurd in 1968.

If I were asked for a one-sentence sound bite on religion I would say I was against it.

So much of religion is exegesis. I would rather follow in the footprints of Christ than all of the dogma.