Glad to be of service. Let me know if there’s anything else you’re curious about: I was planning on writing more about my involvement in Freemasonry, but didn’t really know what to write on.

I’ve also considered navel-gazing posts on the problem of Jephthah, my growing fondness for the Quakers, and how I came to land at seminary. Over at my garden blog, I just did a self-indulgent post on why I’m doing an organic garden, called This is a Victory Garden. It kicks off with a Voltaire quote, so it’s got to be good, right?

1) Religion gives you a cheap way out of guilt. Morality comes, first and foremost, from an ownership of the consequences of your actions- guilt, in other words. Everyone one of the ten commandments can be broken- even by moral people!- in the right circumstances. Thou shalt not kill? Not even in self defense? In a just war? The Quakers may take that commandment seriously, everyone else is crossing their fingers behind their backs.

Heh. Somewhat funny comment, since I’ve been considering becoming a Quaker as a consequence of theological explorations combined with my active support for nonviolence. My biggest issue with them is that they have wandered too far afield from their Christian roots: although the organization was based on undeniably Christian organizers and principles, at least the Durham meeting seems to be fairly explicitly non-Christian at this point. Which is hard for me, because while I appreciate the place where they’re coming from, there’s some baby-with-the-bath-water stuff I would wish they’d keep around. Anyway — back to the primary point.

Human beings can and will game any moral system, and will flock to those who will enable it. While the social structures around Christianity have fallen into that temptation time and time again, at its core Christianity does not give you a free pass — anyone who tries to tell you that you can do whatever you’d like because you’ve accepted Jesus into your heart needs to double back to Romans and Galatians. To repent in Christianity requires an admission of guilt, acknowledgment of what’s wrong with the sin, and an effort to remedy it: that’s what we’re called to and expected to do. Now, God expects the best out of you, but there’s also a safety net provision — God’s not going to judge you simply because you failed to dot all the “i”s and cross all the “t”s. Maybe you consider that the “get out of jail free” card, but to do so is conflating God not expecting perfection and God not expecting the best. And it really is the best — in reality, if you look at what the Bible teaches, life is actually harder on the Christian than non the non-Christian: Matt 10:37-39 and 16:21-25 echo the same sentiment: “If anyone desires to come after Me, let him deny himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me.”

2) Received morality is unquestionable. Think about it. Supposedly, your morality as a Christian comes directly from God. And who are you to question God? Any assumption that morality comes from a divine being (via this particular book and/or person) leads pretty directly to biblical literalism and fundamentalism. The second you start ignoring something in the Bible you are no longer following God’s morality, but your own. Those words in that book, they’re just suggestions. The difference between you and I is that I’m just being honest about it.

While it’s true that at the end of the day I’m drawing my own conclusions, by taking my faith into account I also have a larger set of axioms from which to build. The existence of consciousness in other people, while scientifically and objectively unknowable, is a leap of faith backed up by my religious reading. The fact that the consciousness of others has infinite innate value is another untenable philosophical axiom that I take as a principle of faith. These are things taught by Christianity which seem to be reflected in the nature of the world.

Although I believe in the scriptures as the greatest reference book on moral issues and the vessel of a sacred tradition of divine interaction, I also believe that the Bible was written by people, and so its assertions need to be checked against the Creator’s work. The Christian way of thinking about morality, sin, self-sacrifice, and repentance strongly echoes our own (re-)discoveries in economics (Keynesian economics is inherently kenotic), politics (servant-leadership), psychotherapy (personal accountability and growth), and sociology (interconnectedness/self-sacrifice), and so I take that as evidence of Christianity’s accuracy that the key messages laid out — the ones that validate those theories — have some kind of innate and profound accuracy.

3) Is it a sin when God commands it? I’m not even just talking about modern (post-Jesus) religious wars and crime- although there are more than a few of those- the old testament (literal word of God, remember) is full of crap that’s horrific when you stop to think about it. Murder and rape and robbery and war, all at the behest of a loving and benevolent god. This is the ultimate “get out jail free ” card- you’re not committing a sin because you’re performing God’s will.

This is actually the hardest issue in Christianity, and one that is painfully difficult to struggle with. Kierkegaard explored the Abraham and Isaac story in particular — even if God finally intervened and stopped Abraham, the reality is that Abraham was ready to sacrifice Isaac, and that can’t be confused as anything more than really a deep and profound sin. Yet God both asked for it and rewarded it. Which implies something significant about the non-literal nature of God’s Word, but also about the crisis that Christians have to struggle through. Jesus, after all, was also regularly being identified as a sinner and a heretic, and by the best thinkers at the time in His tradition, He was. This issue is the core of Kierkegaard’s Fear and Trembling, and the general Christian existentialist thinking.

4) Religion demeans the human condition, because it promises rewards in the next life- excusing crimes committed in this life. You know where the term “secular humanist” comes from? It’s older than you might think- it actually came from the early Renaissance, and it meant that the secular human- this life, here on earth- had value and deserved respect. This stood in stark contrast with the dominate philosophy and teachings of the church, which said (paraphrasing) it doesn’t matter if you get pissed on this life, your reward is in the next life. Which has a lot of support in the bible. The secular humanist position was that it did matter if you got pissed on in this life. The whole point of secular humanism is that there is a value to a human being, the actual human being in front of you right now. Any point where you’re talking about the value of a human being, you are adopting the secular humanist position.

Our Father, who art in Heaven,
Hallowed by thy name,
Thy kingdom come,
Thy will be done,
On Earth as it is in Heaven

To portray Christianity as being about the next life is to do a profound disservice to the religion. Most certainly, it’s a disservice the ruling elite of the social structures around Christianity — for the exact reasons you lay out — often propagated. But the emphasis on the afterlife is a Greco-Egyptian idea, foreign to the prophets of the Old Testament or to those traditions around Jesus and the earliest epistles. The idea leaks in to some of the latest books and (via Gnosticism and the Roman church) back into the mainstream traditions of Christianity.

5) Fear of punishment is not the only motivator. Religion treats people like children. In addition to assuming they can’t figure anything out for themselves or take responsibility for their own actions, it also assumes that the only reason they will do good is fear of punishment. Not everyone needs a Super Daddy, or Almighty Father, to spank us when we step out of line. Simple empathy goes a surprisingly long way. I don’t hurt other people because I empathize with them. Hurting them hurts me.

Ignoring the last four sentences (I’ll get to them later), I deeply agree with the statement about organized religion often infantilize people. Insofar as it does that, it’s doing more harm than good. I can intellectually understand the justification to a certain extent — people aren’t going to put the study and thought they should into morality, so it’s best just to give them the Cliff’s Notes — but the solution seems to cause more problems than it solves.

Do you really feel no empathy what so ever to your fellow man? Can you not imagine that I might, also? We have a word for people who truly feel no empathy- we call them psychotics. Is you contention that all human beings are really psychotics, or just secular humanists? Psychotics scare us for damned good reasons, and it scares me that you can’t think of why someone would value another human being without fear of punishment.

Sure. So I can decide not to hurt other people because it upsets me. But that equally means that if it doesn’t upset me, I shouldn’t care about someone being hurt. And if I don’t like someone, so hurting them makes me feel better (and I won’t get punished for it or somehow have that “feel better” reduced), I should go for it. At the end of the day, the “I like people, so I don’t hurt them” argument is just Nietzschean narcissism in much gentler, more palatable packaging.

That’s a just fine philosophical stance: in fact, I think it’s the only defensible atheistic philosophical stance. Unfortunately (from a Christian standpoint), the prescriptive aspect of it is that philosophical stance is that caring about people is self-limiting and self-destructive, and therefore to be minimized insofar as it can be without causing additional harm to yourself.

At the end of the day, the question boils down to this: if you’re in a situation where hurting someone else gains you in real ways more than it loses you — meaning that whatever reward you get outweighs the punishment — should you go ahead and hurt the person? A Christian (insofar as I understand Christianity) has to say “No”. A Nietzschean says “Sure”. This is basic idea behind “just war”, punishment-based prison systems (as opposed to “restorative justice”), etc.

This is especially ironic, given how central avoiding punishment for your sins is to most religions (especially western religions). If there is no morality without threat of punishment, then doesn’t anything that removes the threat of punishment for transgressions undermine morality?

Christianity teaches that avoiding sin is living in accord with the nature of the world and of God — and that we want to be in accord with God and His creation because we love Him. That’s not motivation via fear of punishment, although it’s certainly true that it’s not very comfortable for a Christian to live out of accord with God and His creation.

I’d argue that Religion is an impediment to morality. WTF, you say? Well consider:

1) Religion gives you a cheap way out of guilt. Morality comes, first and foremost, from an ownership of the consequences of your actions- guilt, in other words. Everyone one of the ten commandments can be broken- even by moral people!- in the right circumstances. Thou shalt not kill? Not even in self defense? In a just war? The Quakers may take that commandment seriously, everyone else is crossing their fingers behind their backs.

Every religion I know off offers cheap and easy forgiveness for your sins. Just send a bunch of money to P.O. Box… The more staid and institutional religions aren’t quite so blatant about it, but the end result is the same- accept Jesus into your heart (aka support the religion- maybe not monetarily, but socially), perform this not too onerous of a absolution rite, and you’re off scot-free.

To which I say bullshit. Jesus may have forgiven you- I don’t know, he’s not returning my phone calls- but the crime still exists. The harm created still exists. I’ve hurt people in my life- nothing serious, I’m glad to say, but I have sinned. And it doesn’t matter what sort of performance art I do, they’re still hurt. Some sins I’ve made up for, others I just get to carry around as regrets. But this makes me much more cautious about making irrevocable decisions I might regret later. This makes me more moral- makes me more aware of the fact that I own the consequences of my actions. No easy way out for me.

2) Received morality is unquestionable. Think about it. Supposedly, your morality as a Christian comes directly from God. And who are you to question God? Any assumption that morality comes from a divine being (via this particular book and/or person) leads pretty directly to biblical literalism and fundamentalism. The second you start ignoring something in the Bible you are no longer following God’s morality, but your own. Those words in that book, they’re just suggestions. The difference between you and I is that I’m just being honest about it.

3) Is it a sin when God commands it? I’m not even just talking about modern (post-Jesus) religious wars and crime- although there are more than a few of those- the old testament (literal word of God, remember) is full of crap that’s horrific when you stop to think about it. Murder and rape and robbery and war, all at the behest of a loving and benevolent god. This is the ultimate “get out jail free ” card- you’re not committing a sin because you’re performing God’s will.

4) Religion demeans the human condition, because it promises rewards in the next life- excusing crimes committed in this life. You know where the term “secular humanist” comes from? It’s older than you might think- it actually came from the early Renaissance, and it meant that the secular human- this life, here on earth- had value and deserved respect. This stood in stark contrast with the dominate philosophy and teachings of the church, which said (paraphrasing) it doesn’t matter if you get pissed on this life, your reward is in the next life. Which has a lot of support in the bible. The secular humanist position was that it did matter if you got pissed on in this life. The whole point of secular humanism is that there is a value to a human being, the actual human being in front of you right now. Any point where you’re talking about the value of a human being, you are adopting the secular humanist position.

By the way, this is a very comforting philosophy for the ruling elite. I’m a lord and you’re a serf because God made us this way, and rebelling against that is rebelling against God, and puts your immortal soul in danger. Since you’re only going to be alive for a short period of time, but in heaven or hell for all eternity, it makes sense to put up with the deprivations and crimes in the here and now in return for an eternal reward. Now stop thrashing so, before you splash some piss back on me. Of course, my attitude may be formed by the fact that my ancestors were, by and large, peasants and not nobles.

5) Fear of punishment is not the only motivator. Religion treats people like children. In addition to assuming they can’t figure anything out for themselves or take responsibility for their own actions, it also assumes that the only reason they will do good is fear of punishment. Not everyone needs a Super Daddy, or Almighty Father, to spank us when we step out of line. Simple empathy goes a surprisingly long way. I don’t hurt other people because I empathize with them. Hurting them hurts me.

Do you really feel no empathy what so ever to your fellow man? Can you not imagine that I might, also? We have a word for people who truly feel no empathy- we call them psychotics. Is you contention that all human beings are really psychotics, or just secular humanists? Psychotics scare us for damned good reasons, and it scares me that you can’t think of why someone would value another human being without fear of punishment.

This is especially ironic, given how central avoiding punishment for your sins is to most religions (especially western religions). If there is no morality without threat of punishment, then doesn’t anything that removes the threat of punishment for transgressions undermine morality?

The point here is not to piss people off. although I have no doubt doubt I’ve done exactly that. The point here is that religion has no monopoly on morality. Never has, never will.