George Packer

For 20 years, my mother, my sister and I had seldom spoken of my father. If he happened to come up in conversation, pain and embarrassment entered the room and stayed until he disappeared back into the silence with which we all felt more at ease.

Men of patriarchal cultures have been committing heinous acts in the name of their God ever since they created a god for themselves. It seems that the earlier, goddess-oriented, nature-centered religions were far less cruel.