And my point is that the most devout Christian will still do whatever he/she thinks is in their best own interest. The difference might be that the Christian is motivated because of the promise of eternal life but that doesn’t mean that the moral code differs much, if any, from an atheist perspective.
The problem with your idea is that people do things for reasons, and based on their world view. And the atheist has no foundation or logical reason to do what is right, and even can argue that his world-view does not acknowledge the existence universal right and wrong.
They can have the same sense of right and wrong and react to situations in the exact same manner.
But people do things for reasons. Ideas have consequences. I realize that there are many atheists who live far better lives then they can logically argue for. Often they have been influenced growing up by somebody who was influenced by somebody who at some point had moral Christian principles. But as time goes on, and Atheists become more comfortable with being right and they become more and more isolated from any moral influence, we will see more and more lying and cheating - the very stuff that makes the world the way it is today.
The principles that Christ espoused are universal,
Except the part about the evil being judged in the end. Jesus gave many parables where he illustrated that in the end there will be the judgment. If you're not familiar with what I'm talking about let me know and I'll get some more material on it, but in general I'm thinking of the parable of the sower, and of the wheat and the tares, at the moment.
But the principles that Christ taught were only compulsory because of the principle that in the end we would be judged for our evil deeds.
and they are the truth whether or not one believes in the rest of the rest of the stuff. One can believe those principles whether or not they have ever even heard of Jesus.
So are you saying that Jesus' principles of judgment and Him giving his life to redeem us from sin are truth whether or not one believes in the rest of the stuff?
Atheists certainly can be amoral, but that doesn’t automatically mean that they are. If your point is that “right and wrong” cannot logically exist outside of a context of God,
My point is that universal right and wrong cannot exist outside of a context of God. (or some moral law giver who is supreme over all humans)
Without a supreme moral lawgiver, there is no such thing as universal right or wrong. A group of people may agree that it is okay for them to kill innocent people and by their own law it is right (for example your example of a "muslim suicide bombers" - to him Alah is God and his holybook well may and many of his peers do condone what he does. But that doesn't make it right - and without one absolute moral lawgiver, what the suicide bomber does is not wrong either, because universal wrong doesn't exist.
I think I have to fundamentally disagree. There is no dispute that muslim suicide bombers fervently believe in God, but that really has no bearing on whether their actions are right.
The muslim God is not the Biblical God. At most, one is true - they are contradictory in so many ways. As a matter of fact, of all the religions of the world, at most one is true. It may be they are all wrong, but at most one is right.
Jesus’s words would be correct even if there is no God at all. Right and wrong are concepts that stand alone. Whether they’re eventually enforced by a divine being is a somewhat separate issue.
But as I said, people do things for reasons, and the concept of universal right and wrong (And the only alternative to universal right and wrong is might makes right) does require a supreme moral lawgiver.
-Jesse
Exactly! And this is the lesson that children learn when they are taught about the origins of mankind from a godless worldview perspective.
Without a God-centered worldview, children learn directly and indirectly that morals, ethics, and values are human inventions and are not immutable laws. The same is true for the human rights outlined in our Declaration of Independence. These rights no longer permanent gifts from god but that they are granted to us by government or other men.
Thankfully it is now becoming widely accepted that their are only two worldviews possible when teaching children. That worldview is either atheistic or God-centered. Neither is religiously neutral in content or consequences.
The solution, of course, it to get government out of the K-12 business. We must begin privatizing universal K-12 education.
Well, after all our discussion it seems to boil down to whether someone who doesn’t believe in God can believe in right or wrong. And I’m not an atheist, so maybe I’m not their best advocate. In fact, until I graduated from college and went on to postgraduate school, I was in a parochical school system. So it’s not like I haven’t learned about these things.
You are arguing that the other things Jesus talked about, i.e., judgment day are what’s important. And it certainly is. But I’m talking about how poeple conduct their lives. There were billions of souls born before Jesus ever spoke a word, and certainly nearly 100% of them never heard of the Torah or anything like it.
How are they to be judged? I’d like to think it would be based on their concept of right and wrong. Were they good people or not?
If that’s accurate, then right and wrong exist outside the concept of an organized religion. You don’t believe it exists outside of a real God who sets those boundaries. I do. Depending on whether one believes in God or not can certainly influence an individual to fudge or completely violate the right or wrong standard, but I don’t think the fear of God defines whether right or wrong exists as a concept.
We fundamentally disagree on this and I don’t think we can reach common ground with more discussion. I appreciate your perspective and it might be correct. I think mine might be also.
In the long run, I’m not sure it matters. We both agree that we should live our lives doing what is right.