Marco Respinti Quotes

The same truth we trust to finally prevail is the same truth [Freedom of Religion or Belief] is made of. Religions and spiritual ways are not all the same. What is the same is the honest spirit that animates all believers in different religions. What is really true of all religions, including religions that a believer in another religion may regard as false, is the afflatus for truth that motivates them. No matter how different beliefs and believers may be, no matter how many conflicts they may have between each other, that single element, a thirst and hunger for truth, makes them similar, make their devotees sisters and brothers, make them human and unique.

Let’s interpret [Argentinian American economist Alejandro A.] Chafuen’s remarks in its deepest and broader sense: social justice has little or nothing to do with interference by abusive powers, be it from a government, a rogue bureaucrat, an ideological faction, or an organized group. As [Father Luigi Taparelli d’Azeglio] made clear, Chafuen argued, the “justice” implied in “social justice” is not only what the law establishes. It does include the strict, and even technical, legal aspects of the law, but it is chiefly a matter of social concord. It is philosophical before being legal; it is spiritual in nature.

Those who merely tolerate fail to acknowledge the full dignity and humanity of others, including enemies. Tolerance is in fact the concession of something that some who consider themselves superiors grant to some they consider inferiors, out of their graciousness or, worse, their haughtiness. When simply tolerated, people do not have an inherent right to exist because they are human beings: they enjoy existence only because someone else recognizes and permits it.

While violence is always something negative, force is the capacity and power to make the objects of will possible.
It has a fundamental moral side in the cognate term “fortitude,” which is one of the four cardinal virtues, or the hinge excellencies that are required for a virtuous life.

In 2010, Kilgour and Matas were nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize.
In fact, who works more for peace than the one who debunks lies, defends the innocents, and saves lives?
Of course, Kilgour and Matas were never awarded the prize, but this tells us more about the world we live in than about the two [civil] rights defenders.

As the movie [The Book of Eli] teaches, words may have the power to convince and move if they are rich and meaningful, or the power to disappoint and let people down if they are poor and prosaic. Media use words to challenge power or to promote alternative powers, becoming either servants of the power, or watchdogs of the power, or another power themselves. All depend on the words that media choose to use: either the words of truth or the words of the yes-men and the servants of the powers that be.
...Truth is not limited to its material vessels.
Media have the power to mobilize for freedom of religion, belief, and creed of Tai Ji Men and all other persecuted groups because they are guardians of words, and words may contain truth. Media only need to start believing it, in Taiwan and all over the world.

People who suffered persecution, as well as their relatives and friends, know that while individuals can always change their hearts, and even the cruelest criminal may convert, structures based on evil principles can only either persevere in their wrongdoings or change their foundations and become something totally different.

Religious freedom does not mean that all religions are the same: it means that truth matters, and this is what religion and the sense of the sacred are all about.
Every man and woman has the right to know the truth, but only full freedom allows them to progress in that direction.

…laws should always embody justice, otherwise justice becomes what laws arbitrarily decide it to be. And, as the Tai Ji Men case shows all too well after 29 years, and in this special year 2025, laws can sometimes be unjust.

We cannot speak of [civil] rights without centering our attention on [the moral compass of] conscience, one among a few distinctive features that make humans human‒and humane.

Freedom is immaterial and universal, and for this reason untouchable and undeniable. While liberties can be denied and curtailed, freedom cannot. While suffering for the loss of their liberties for more than a quarter of a century, Tai Ji Men dizi could always enjoy their freedom. Freedom lives in their souls and spirits and is not affected by external harassment.

Is there a risk that reducing the debate on religious liberty to different forms of state recognition, including the Italian “,” may implicitly or inadvertently confer to the state the power to grant to religious groups the right to exist? In practice, states do have such power in different countries. The question is whether giving such an authority to the state is morally and philosophically correct.
Perhaps, a state should just watch over the compliance of its citizens with the laws (assuming the laws are just), regardless of their religious persuasion, and leave religious groups alone to live and self-regulate their lives. The state is not the source of religious liberty, although it should acknowledge and protect it.

Yes, we all know that curiosity killed the cat, but indifference kills people, both physically and metaphorically, every single day, when it surrenders to despots, aggressors, and villains.

Taxation imposed in an exaggerate, unjust, or unlawful way violates citizens’ fundamental rights to liberty and private property, and amounts to persecution, which is another name for violence.

…it is logically absurd to want to defend the environment by making humans suffer for this. In fact, the environment is for humans. As there can be no humans if the natural environment is inhospitable to life, an environment with no humans is not what all of us are interested in. …To function properly, [the society] needs to cherish the unalienable reality of its members. If someone considers a fellow human being or a group of humans or the whole of humanity as an enemy, a virus or a disease to be extirpated, societies become terrestrial hells. …From Tai Ji Men’s teachings one can in fact easily draw the idea that there can be no real care for the environment if there is no conscientious care for humans.