Max Brooks

Any survival guide will tell you, don't buy a pair of combat boots before any disaster. They'll tear your feet up. Or water - don't bring water with you because it'll tire you out and you'll lose too much fluid. Bring a water pump.

To ask questions can become the laziest and wobbliest occupation of a mind, but when you must yourself answer the problem that you have posed, you will meditate your question with care and frame it with precision.

There are clearly many good politicians who are guided by religious belief, so the mix can work. But there's a line to be drawn. It would be hugely dangerous for a country's laws to be set by the scriptures, and particularly those of the expansionist religions.