Religion is the outcome neither of the fear of death, nor of the fear of God. It answers a deep need in man. It is neither a metaphysic, nor a morality, but above all and essentially an intuition and a feeling...Dogmas are not, properly speaking, part of religion: rather they are derived from it. Religion is the miracle of direct relationship with the infinite; and dogmas are the reflection of this miracle. Similarly belief in God, and in personal immortality, are not necessarily a part of religion; one can conceive of a religion without God, and it would be pure contemplation of the universe; the desire for personal immortality seems rather to show a lack of religion, since religion assumes a desire to lose oneself in the infinite, rather than to preserve one's own finite self.
It is important not to confuse religion with dogma. The latter proceeds from the former, not the other way around. Spirituality without religion is like a writer with no pen or paper. Good ideas, but no way to work those ideas into a meaningful practice.
