Religion’s Subjective Morals
Many theists argue that morals are not subjective. Not content to just live and believe as they see fit, they strive to impose their code of ethics on everyone else.
There are of course certain moral convictions that few argue with and we can say that these are fairly universal. As our definitions of what constitutes a human being differ, abortion does not fall into that category.
In a recent encounter with the author of a pro-life article and his flock, the afore mentioned have defended their stance on abortion with the self-attributed favour of God and His will. According to them God sets the standards, and He clearly states in the bible that a month old fetus is indeed a human being.
The oldest records of induced abortion go back to 1550 BCE, but the church began to outlaw abortion only in the 19th century. If the bible has not changed since it was written, it can be concluded that even within Christianity alone the morals are changing. All this despite there having been no new word from God.
While making a claim for universal and unchanging moral code, the church is obviously changing how they define morals. This is a completely arbitrary process guided by humans alone – not an all knowing, wise, and loving god.
Yet again the believer searches for vague biblical passages to justify newly formed beliefs and biases, not for the truth. And every time he has a personal epiphany, he preaches to the world about the new will of God while claiming an ancient book as his ultimate witness. I’ve seen better con jobs enter my spam folder, but that’s not saying much when comparing it to such transparent and obvious attempts at thought control.
Alas, when a promise for entrance into an eternal kingdom is made, all sorts of rational people become quite irrational. Their mortality gets the better of them, and in their desperate state, snake oil begins to take on a sweet aroma.
What’s really amusing is watching apologists trying to use reason to trash the use of reason as an approach to ethics (because of human fallibility) . I tell you – the number of irony meters I’ve had to replace thanks to that line of argument!
To be blessed with an irony meter that of a theist… Indeed, “science has nothing to do with god, but we keep searching for scientific proof to change that”, “god is great, our minds to small to understand him – god most certainly doesn’t approve of gay marriage”, “everything needs a prime mover. everything except god”.
Sometimes it’s like a surreal nightmare – a land with common sense at par with the temperature of the Arctic. Infact it’s so far-fetched that it’s almost enough to make you start believing in god as you take your daily dose of prozac before hitting the religious blogs. As the happy pill takes effect and dulls the edge of the deeply depressing ridiculousness, one can be forgiven for wanting to attribute the positive effect to god. After all, there’s something miraculous about humming a happy tune while reading theistic ‘logic.’