[Brian Kopp DPM]

Bumping (I don't have my ping list on this computer, I'll bump to the rest of it later.)

[la$tminutepardon]

And even Jesus said, "Why do you call me good?"

[evangmlw]

Inspired by the Holy Spirit, the Apostle Paul said, "ALL have turned aside, together they have become useless; There is none who does good, there IS NOT EVEN ONE." There is no good outside of God! Unless a man is "born-again, he cannot inherit the kingdom of God." Man is born with inate sin (the propensity to sin). For this reason he can do no good and is destined to hell unless he repents and receives Jesus Christ.

[VaBthang4]

"Can We Be Good Without God"

Yeah...

Aint gonna get "you" anything...but sure you can.

[Buckeroo]

Your article stimulates my thinking about basic morals and principles about our lives. Where does GOD sit, with this recent travesty on 9-11? How can we, as Americans, face ourselves that we are today highly regarded as an enemy?

We aren't a warring nation. We have never been a warring nation with the intent to plunder. But here we are, wondering about GOD, country and our families united to destroy our enemies. There is a message in all this and I don't get it, yet. I don't know how GOD regards good but "we" certainly know what evil is, don't we?

[Dr. Good Will Hunting]

...for the Bible itself makes the opposite claim: it says God has written a law on the hearts of all.

I have always contended that this was so.

Which brings up, indirectly, the un-baptized baby question:

Will a baby who dies un-baptized go to Heaven?

Yes.

For the heart of the infant is pure, and where such purity is, there is God also. One cannot exist without the other.

[MRM]

bump

[grumpster-dumpster]

A Thanks or posting this BUMP! :)

[stuartcr]

Of course we can. There are many atheists that do good.

[Lev]

From the Biblical point of view, the reason it?s so difficult to argue with an atheist ? as I once was ? is that he?s not being honest with himself. He knows that there is a God; he only tells himself he doesn?t know.

This argument is as strong as "believers know that there really is no God, they are just not being honest with themselves."
Regards.

[Heuristic Hiker]

Yes we can! And it is one of the most significant theological points that differentiates Christians from other religions, in particular Islam.

Muslim Voluntarism, “the divine command theory,” completely dispenses with freedom. It is a deterministic system par excellent. The traditionalist believes that good deeds are good only because God commands them, and evil is evil because God forbids it. Man cannot know good, except by the will of Allah. In the Western intellectual tradition the impact of voluntarism has been significant but ultimately not dominate, whereas in the Muslim, it has been a central element.

The alternative to voluntarism is objectivism and the religious expression this took in the western tradition was through the theory of a natural law, which states: God reveals moral law to humankind, and prescribes obedience to it. The moral law is intrinsically good. This tradition prevails in the Jewish Bible, particularly in the Wisdom books. It was a tradition which was to have a deep impact on Christianity in general and its secular law in particular. In this tradition, God’s command is merely prescriptive of what is, from a purely descriptive point of view, good for human beings.

[Brian Kopp DPM]

"He who denies the existence of God, has some reason for wishing that God did not exist."

--St. Augustine

[FairWitness]

Can we be educated without schools? Some will, most won't.

Can we be healthy without exercise and a good diet? Some will, most won't.

"Can we be good without God?" Some will, most won't.

[steve-b]

But then I asked him whether he thought he could go a week without selfishness, without resentment, without lust. I asked whether he thought he could go a day, an hour, ten minutes.

What an idiot. Nobody meets that standard whether they believe in God or not -- hence, his own argument reduces God to irrelevance.

[Antoninus]

Can we be good without God? Yes, it's possible. Just highly unlikely. Men have enough trouble being good when they know that God is watching. Once we adopt the belief that there is no God, there is suddenly no obligation to do good and a great temptation to do evil to achieve immediate personal gain or satisfaction.

Lord knows, atheistic societies have certainly attracted flocks of immigrants wishing to bask in their gentle goodness... Can you say 'track record'?

[Frumious Bandersnatch]

I believe that goodbye is a contraction of "God be with ye."

[lavaroise]

Oh gees, what a prosecutorial question against religion, devoid of objectivity. Why not ask instead: can we be good as slaves of physics? or as slaves of lesser gods?

Frankly, to ask the question is to answer it.

[Gargantua]

"Can we be good without God?"

No. We can't even be good with Him. But, with Jesus, we can be forgiven for being sinners.

[ArGee]

I enjoy Budziszewski when I read him in World, but he isn't always the easiest to follow. I have not found a better discussion of the question than that by C.S. Lewis in The Abolition of Man although most publicly schooled people can't follow that one very well either.

Thanks for the article.

Shalom.