Michael Dowd Quotes

The 's health has been in decline for one or two centuries, and in runaway collapse... for decades... The Great Acceleration of Gaian Collapse.

[W]hat a difference it makes to be groping our way forward in faith—in partnership with God, or, should you prefer less traditional terminology: trusting the Universe... Reality... Time.

[W]e chose to display on our van both a Jesus fish and a Darwin fish—kissing. A retired biology professor... laughed, "Oh great! Now you piss everyone off!"

Traditional religions have played crucial roles in fostering cooperation within each tribe, kingdom, and early nation—though not infrequently by provoking suspicion and enmity of those outside the group. ...[T]o fulfill their potentials in our postmodern world, each will have to harmonize its core doctrines with the evolutionary world view. ...[T]he evolutionary outlook bolsters their core teachings. Instead of an intrusion... a precious blessing.

Discussing Thank God for Evolution! with those you care about will open new doors of possibility... and provide common ground where none existed before. This book is a perfect gift, not to convert others to your way of thinking but to converse... deeply and heartfully about those things that matter most.

I promise that this book will provide... an experience of science, and evolution specifically, that will fire your imagination, touch your heart, and lead you to a place of deep gratitude, awe, and reverence.

So long as religious and political leaders continue to ignore our evolutionary heritage, and thus do not put in place structures of internal and external support that can withstand the high dosages of that high status and power necessarily confer, then there will be no hope for a less calamitous future.

No otherworldly, unnatural paradise can compare with the utterly <small>REAL</small> heaven I now experience... every moment of every day, free of resentment, guilt, and unfinished business. ...By genuinely appreciating my instincts—thanks to the evolutionary world-view—and creating... structures of support, I now, by grace, experience an ease and freedom I've never known before regarding old habits, patterns, and temptations.

[T]he fact that our Universe has been transforming along a discernible path for billions of years—the fact that creation was not a one-time event—is of little or no dispute. ...[T]his undeniable fact ...makes me want to shout from the mountaintops: "...The war is over!"

Unstoppable collapse... These extinction level tipping points... thresholds that are already in the rear view mirror. Loss of the world's ice... I consider Dahr Jamail's The End of Ice... my favorite book on climate change. If you only read one book on climate change this year, read that...

To agnostics, humanists, atheists, and freethinkers... you will find nothing here that you cannot wholeheartedly embrace as... rationally sound, mainstream scientific understanding of the Universe. ...[T]he vision of "evolutionary spirituality" presented here will benefit you and your loved ones without your needing to believe in anything otherworldly.

[L]et me slip into pride or arrogance, deception or inauthenticity, blame or resentment, or stingy, ungrateful self-centeredness, and I won't have to worry about burning in some otherworldly hell after I die. I'll be supping with Satan right here and now.

May I continue to have the humility, strength, and peer encouragement to do what is necessary to remain in this state of grace. May I be a blessing to those around me. May I leave a positive evolutionary legacy, in service to God. And may the light of the living Christ shine within my heart and continue to guide my steps.

Thanks to our fresh understanding of the deep-time face of grace, science and religion... are ushering each other into greatness.

Denial is also the instinctual impulse to reject or discount information that calls into question our hopes, assumptions, or expectations about the future.