I’m so sorry, but I do not believe that consistent atheists can have a real purpose of life. They might only create a banal purpose** in life** for themselves, which would be limited by their lifespan.
I disagree. Atheists, similar to theists, have moral human values, ambitions, goals, aspirations that are far from banal. They can create a meaning and purpose for their lives here on earth just as theists can. In fact, since this life is all they believe they have, that earthly purpose may become even more precious and meaningful to them than to some theists.
Exactly.
I completely agree, meltzerboy. By any chance, have you ever spent any time with C.S. Lewis? He talks about precisely this in the very beginning of his book Mere Christianity, and he does it in a very relaxed and brilliant way. His basic point was that there is an objective morality which is common to all of humanity, and which encompasses Christians of all stripes, Jews, Muslims, Buddhists, Hindus, Shamans, Pagans, atheists, everybody. Lewis’ examples boil down to fair play and honesty, which are things that everyone expects, even those who feign Nietzchean nihilism, anti-Christianity or other forms of anti-religion. So yeah, you’re right, religion has no monopoly on human decency, or, perhaps, from another vantage point, religious morality has so suffused human thought for so many aeons, that it’s now just our common inheritance as human beings.
As an atheist, I firmly believed that sex was for marriage, abortion was wrong, and same sex unions were an aberration of nature. Sex for entertainment, outside marriage, was not only wrong but unwise. One had to honest, while fraud, deception, stealing, murder was wrong. To me virtue was its own reward since there was no heaven as a reward when I died. This was my thinking as an atheist. However I was not raised in a vacuum so I think the values I held were influenced and probably originated from my grandparents who were devout Catholics.
I think, the words “to them” are key in Your claim. A human here becomes a measure of his/her own morality.
C.S. Lewis was writing at a time when atheists and believers still shared the morals in their substantials. Nowadays the boundaries of right and wrong are switching every year; unless one is a believer, there is little to prevent one from falling into contemporary “everything goes” model.
Yes, I think, Your last phrase is true. Had You not converted, Your children would have had quite different views on morality.
But, this is something atheists and the secular world, and Protestants as well, will usually not admit. They merely adopt their morals and values from the Church. Why else do they get so upset sometimes when they find their beliefs are not in line with Church teaching?
I don’t buy the fair play thing and nowadays I try not to expect it from people, no matter what religion you claim, or lack thereof. That’s just talk. CS Lewis had a faulty premise. It almost implies that a violation of fair play is supposedly the unforgiven sin; he’s writing his own rules. Anyways, if we’re going to go by this, there is nothing fair about abortion for the kid, no matter how normalized it is nowadays. So there we go.