One can't understand the Christian Right and similar movements unless one sees them as reactive - they're reacting to what they call secular humanism Peter L. Berger More Quotes by Peter L. Berger More Quotes From Peter L. Berger A few years ago, a priest working in a slum section of a European city was asked why he was doing it, and replied, 'So that the rumor of God may not completely disappear. Peter L. Berger rumor cities years Unlike puppets we have the possibility of stopping in our movements, looking up and perceiving the machinery by which we have been moved. In this act lies the first steps towards freedom. Peter L. Berger stopping steps lying Institutions provide procedures through which human conduct is patterned, compelled to go, in grooves deemed desirable by society. And this trick is performed by making these grooves appear to the individual as the only possible ones. Peter L. Berger institutions individual procedures If you are good for nothing else, you can still serve as a bad example. Peter L. Berger stills example ifs In acute suffering the need for meaning is as strong or stronger than the need for happiness. Peter L. Berger strong suffering interesting The basic fault lines today are not between people with different beliefs but between people who hold these beliefs with an element of uncertainty and people who hold these beliefs with a pretense of certitude Peter L. Berger lines today people India is the most religious country in the world, Sweden is the most secular country in the world, and America is a country of Indians ruled by Swedes. Peter L. Berger religious country america He who has the bigger stick has the better chance of imposing his definitions of reality. Peter L. Berger definitions sticks reality On the one hand, man is a body, in the same way that this may be said of every other animal organism. On the other hand, man has a body. That is, man experiences himself as an entity that is not identical with his body, but that, on the contrary, has that body at its disposal. In other words, man's experience of himself always hovers in a balance between being and having a body, a balance that must be redressed again and again. Peter L. Berger animal men hands Even if one is interested only in one's own society, which is one's prerogative, one can understand that society much better by comparing it with others. Peter L. Berger prerogative compare ifs The past is malleable and flexible, changing as our recollection interprets and re-explains what has happened. Peter L. Berger recollection history past Religion is the human attitude towards a sacred order that includes within it all being-human or otherwise-i.e., belief in a cosmos, the meaning of which both includes and transcends man. Peter L. Berger attitude men order I think what I and most other sociologists of religion wrote in the 1960s about secularization was a mistake. Our underlying argument was that secularization and modernity go hand in hand. With more modernization comes more secularization Peter L. Berger mistake hands thinking He who sups with the devil had better have a long spoon. The devilry of modernity has its own magic: The [believer] who sups with it will find his spoon getting shorter and shorter--until that last supper in which he is left alone at the table, with no spoon at all and with an empty plate. The devil, one may guess, will by then have gone away to more interesting company. Peter L. Berger gone-away long interesting Some people seem to gravitate from one fundamentalism to another, from some kind of secular fundamentalism into a religious fundamentalism or the other way around, which is not very helpful. Peter L. Berger religious people way Let me say again that the relationship is asymmetrical: there's no democracy without a market economy, but you can have a market economy without democracy. Peter L. Berger market-economy economy democracy The human organism is thus still developing biologically while already standing in a relationship to its environmont. In other words, the process of becoming man takes place in an interrelationship with an environment. (...) From the moment of birth, man's organismic development, and indeed a large part of his biological being as such, are subjected to continuing socially determined interference. Peter L. Berger becoming body men In science, as in love, a concentration on technique is likely to lead to impotence. Peter L. Berger technique love science Language is capable of becoming the objective repository of vast accumulations of meaning and experience, which it can then preserve in time and transmit to following generations. Peter L. Berger generations becoming language In all advanced industrial societies, education has become the single most important vehicle of upward mobility. Peter L. Berger upward-mobility mobility important
