Do christians really have lower moral standards than others

[danharte]

Having read an interesting yet worrying report by Phil Zuckerman, a professor of sociology.
I’m trying to get to grips with the evidence that shows a higher intellectual & moral standard of non religious people.
The conclusions his data provides are quite Compelling & im having a great deal of trouble finding ways to challenge it.
Any help would be appreciated. Thanks

 

[DrTaffy]

Could you cite the report you are referring to?

E.g “Atheism, Secularity, and Well-Being: How the Findings of Social Science Counter Negative Stereotypes and Assumptions” Phil Zuckerman, Sociology Compass 3/6 (2009): p. 949–971

Also, exactly what about the report do you wish to ‘challenge’ and in what way?

Edit: for example, remember that correlation is not causation. If religion caused people to be dumber or less moral, I can see why you might worry. If less intelligent people, or people who have been in trouble with the law, are more likely to turn to religion, so what?

 

[Vianneyizer]

Having read an interesting yet worrying report by Phil Zuckerman, a professor of sociology.
I’m trying to get to grips with the evidence that shows a higher intellectual & moral standard of non religious people.
The conclusions his data provides are quite Compelling & im having a great deal of trouble finding ways to challenge it.
Any help would be appreciated. Thanks

Greeting my beloved. Such things are simply ridiculous. It may be true that a higher percentage of secular humans live at a higher standard in relation to their own moral code. But they could never hold a higher “standard” than our moral code. For the call of Christ is to be perfect just as our father in Heaven is perfect. The absolute heights of our venial sins reaches far higher than the secular world. Ask yourself, " how many irreligious men and women do you know that avoid all 7 deadly sins? Or feel need to go to confession for taking The Lords name in vain accidentally? Or how many secular men do you know who are convinced of sin even when they look upon a women’s more supple parts? You see, we sin more often than seculars (venial I mean - not mortal), not less, because our code is that much higher. To assert otherwise is just silly. I have never, in 30 years of life, known a secular that thought anywhere even close to the ultimate morality of The Church or her saints. St. Francis of Assisi would throw himself in a thorn bush when being tempted to sin; is that not one serious moral inclination to the good? So please, be at ease and don’t let your heart be troubled by such foolishness.

Peace and love to all those resting in God -

Zachary

 

[null]

Having read an interesting yet worrying report by Phil Zuckerman, a professor of sociology.
I’m trying to get to grips with the evidence that shows a higher intellectual & moral standard of non religious people.
The conclusions his data provides are quite Compelling & im having a great deal of trouble finding ways to challenge it.
Any help would be appreciated. Thanks

I think the widespread acceptance of masturbation, pornography, abortion, contraception, pre-marital sex, violent films, etc, are sufficient proof that the non-Christian world’s moral standards are actually much lower than Christian standards. And it’s a bit of a stretch, but I’d also say it’s proof that they have lower intellectual standards too, because honestly, it doesn’t take much thinking to realize that these things are quite wrong.

 

[NekoNecro]

Absolutely, in the western world most of them do. Naturally there are exceptions to this rule as there are in every case (I’ve found Catholics to have higher standards of morality generally to other fundamentalist Christian groups) but yes…Generally? Most of the non-new athiest dawkins worshiping types I’ve met have been far nicer people than some devout Christians.

I mean I’ll go with a protestant denomination with a mostly African immigrant congregation near me, let’s look at what they promote and draw from scripture to support as good morality on signs outside their church…

• Execution of homosexuals
• Execution of Adulterers
• Execution of people who receive an abortion
• Execution of apostates
• Non belivers must be heckled until they convert
• Women should not vote
• Children who disrespect their parents should be beaten to within an inch of their lives for “deliverance”

And lets look at the tenants of an LGBT support center funded by a rather wealthy athiest-owned family business further down the road I’ve seen promoted on signs out the front…

-Equal rights for all

• Adultery is bad, but not criminal
• Freedom of religion or lack of it
  -Everyone should be free to do what they want provided it doesn’t harm anyone else
• Women are equal to men
• Children who are badly beaten should be taken away from abusive parents and cared by foster parents who aren’t insane.

I’m sorry…As a Christian, I hold my hands up. There are some denominations who aren’t like this (Catholics, Lutherans ect) but there’s a lot of Evangelicals and other fundamentalists who literally follow a code I wouldn’t hesitate to describe as malevolent and psychotic. If they used any other excuse other than religion to promote some of these beliefs, they’d have been chucked into an asylum and dubbed criminally insane.

Although that said, I am talking about the secular sense of right and wrong here, which is very different from the ones most here would use.

On CAF morals can reduced to three (if rather generalizing) categorizations

Good/Holy: Anything God does like (E.G: Worship, reading a Hagiography).
Neutral: Anything without a focus on God (E.G: Eating Mcdonalds,reading a novel).
Sinful: Anything God doesn’t like (E.G: Fornication, porn, reading heretical literature).

Whereas the rest of the secular world sees it like this

Good: That which improves the lives of others (E.G: Charity work)
Neutral: That which has no impact on the lives of non-participants (E.G: Sex, porn)
Evil: That which directly and intentionally harms others. (E.G: Murder)

Christians tend to view morality through the system of absolute adherence to law, while secularists are more concerned with emotion and (generally) human happiness. They both might call it morality, but they’re both very different deciding factors for working out what is right and wrong.

 

[Ender]

Having read an interesting yet worrying report by Phil Zuckerman, a professor of sociology.
I’m trying to get to grips with the evidence that shows a higher intellectual & moral standard of non religious people.

"One has to belong to the intelligentsia to believe things like that: no ordinary man could be such a fool." Orwell
Ender

 

[John_Martin]

Having read an interesting yet worrying report by Phil Zuckerman, a professor of sociology.
I’m trying to get to grips with the evidence that shows a higher intellectual & moral standard of non religious people.
The conclusions his data provides are quite Compelling & im having a great deal of trouble finding ways to challenge it.
Any help would be appreciated. Thanks

The report - does it say “religious people”, or does it say “Catholics”? We are a people different from the world’s peoples who have “religious preferences”. Catholics believe and live by what was delivered to them authoritatively. Others define their own interpretations of standards.

John Martin

 

[Kamaduck]

Having read an interesting yet worrying report by Phil Zuckerman, a professor of sociology.
I’m trying to get to grips with the evidence that shows a higher intellectual & moral standard of non religious people.
The conclusions his data provides are quite Compelling & im having a great deal of trouble finding ways to challenge it.
Any help would be appreciated. Thanks

You know, I would be really interested in how they’re measuring both of those things. “Intellectual standards” is subjective enough on its own- are we talking about education? Because I think it’s been established that college is not always kind to religious people. Are we talking IQ? That’s intelligence (or one kind of intelligence, anyway), but it doesn’t seem like it would really correspond to “intellectual standards”.

But “moral standards” would be really interesting, because in a secular report, they’re sure to be measured differently than I would define moral standards. There are many things that are considered almost universally evil in our culture, and a few that are considered almost universally good, and then there are many actions that many disagree about. I would like to know how exactly they measured people’s “moral standards”. It could make a big difference in what the results mean.

 

[izzydizzydo]

I once began reading a highly intellectual book that challenge a few of our churches teaching hoping to understand why certain Protestants thought as they did. When I told a retired friend who is a church scholar he said, “I know that book. If were you I would stop reading it now before it has the effect on you that the cunning author intended.”

Jerry was right. It took a couple of years before I was able to forget just one argumment the author made that caused me to question my faith. Just another scheme of the Devil!

 

[Nacho45]

Its propaganda, nothing more. The atheistic intellectual elitists have been trying to undermine Christianity for a very long time. You must ask yourself if these people are on a higher moral ground than Christians, where does their morality originate. You must also remember, they base this off their own criteria. Anyone could do this and justify their conclusions. Just look at the fanatical religious groups (unless this was the focus of the paper, I don’t know because you didn’t provide that information) around the world murdering innocents for no reason other than they do not meet their own self-created moral requirements. We did not create our own morals, God did this for us and we simply either follow or do not follow. Our moral standard is divine in nature. We, however, are not and subject to failure. Again, it’s nothing more than a jab at Christians in a lost world, perhaps through indirect means.

 

[danharte]

Thank you all so much for your answers, they’ve helped me a great deal in trying to get to grips with the issue but I know I have a lot more to do to resolve it completely in my head.
I’m unable to copy & paste the link but if your Interested in having a look you can find it by searching “Phil Zuckerman pdf” & it should be the first pdf document in the search results.
The report takes in all forms of Christianity & includes prison rates for each denomination, catholics being the highest :-(.
The problem is, how can I respond to this study with solid reason if I’m ever confronted with it, it’s bad enough that my 13 year old son is an atheist even when I’ve presented him with reasonable arguments for the existance of God, courtesy of Trent Horn’s Answering Atheism
Should he read this study or anything like it, surely that may be the nail in the coffin of a conversion

 

[Nacho45]

Thank you all so much for your answers, they’ve helped me a great deal in trying to get to grips with the issue but I know I have a lot more to do to resolve it completely in my head.
I’m unable to copy & paste the link but if your Interested in having a look you can find it by searching “Phil Zuckerman pdf” & it should be the first pdf document in the search results.
**The report takes in all forms of Christianity & includes prison rates for each denomination, catholics being the highest :-(.**The problem is, how can I respond to this study with solid reason if I’m ever confronted with it, it’s bad enough that my 13 year old son is an atheist even when I’ve presented him with reasonable arguments for the existance of God, courtesy of Trent Horn’s Answering Atheism
Should he read this study or anything like it, surely that may be the nail in the coffin of a conversion

Two things:

1. There are more Catholics in the world than any other Christian group. Statistically, this is bound to happen.
2. Being a Catholic doesn’t mean being a good Catholic in the same way being a police officer doesn’t mean one always follows the law or a teacher mean one can actually teach.

 

[danharte]

My apologies, I’ve only just been able to log in & didn’t read all of the later replies.
Thanks again for all your wise advice & may God bless you all

 

[NekoNecro]

I once began reading a highly intellectual book that challenge a few of our churches teaching hoping to understand why certain Protestants thought as they did. When I told a retired friend who is a church scholar he said, “I know that book. If were you I would stop reading it now before it has the effect on you that the cunning author intended.”

Jerry was right. It took a couple of years before I was able to forget just one argumment the author made that caused me to question my faith. Just another scheme of the Devil!

I think it was Judge Judy who I heard say these very wise words “If it doesn’t make sense it isn’t true”

Not reading something purely because it forces us to question our beliefs is showing a lesser intellectual capactity like this report suggests, Tell me, supposing I could show you evidence right now that proved beyond a doubt Christianity was false (I couldn’t for one moment, I am a Christian myself) and the one true Goddess was really Isis, supposing she poped up in front of you right this instant and preformed a miracle like ending world hunger would you still reject it as lies even if it was before your very eyes beyond a shadow of a doubt? Would you honestly?

I wouldn’t. As far as I recall the Catholic Church itself admits God and the truth of it’s can be found through reason, so why should anyone be scared of an opposing argument? If it turns out yours was wrong then…Shouldn’t you be happy you’ve been enlightened and found the truth? And if you are right, it should be simple to prove them wrong.

Reason is not Satanic.

 

[danharte]

My apologies, I’ve only just been able to log in & didn’t read all of the later replies.
Thanks again for all your wise advice & may God bless you all

 

[danharte]

I wish to thank you all once again for all your kind words & wise insights.
I’ve spent the best part of today trying to deal with this problem & with your help along with Google & armed with the correct questions I’m satisfied that I can defend Christianity’s so called inferior morality.
I’ve put together a list of extremely difficult crimes to trace & investigate which are by their nature are often held by “the educated” non religious just in case anyone is tackled with this issue
embezzlement, Bribery, Securities fraud, Insider trading, money laundering, tax evasion, Mail fraud Computer or Internet fraud, telemarketing fraud, bankruptcy fraud, Insurance fraud, economic espionage and trade secret theft & Environmental law violations.
I’m sure there are other angles to be looked at but my mind is very much at ease now.
Thank you all so much & I mean that sincerely. God bless

 

[DrTaffy]

1. There are more Catholics in the world than any other Christian group. Statistically, this is bound to happen.

No, it is more than that. In many, if not most, western countries Catholics make up a greater percentage of the prison population than they do of the general population. So Catholics actually do break the law more than the average.

See for example this article:

Figures compiled for the report showed that while Catholics make up 44% of the general population, around 55% of inmates are drawn from the Catholic community.

In contrast, atheists make up a much lower proportion of the prison population than they do of the general population.

The only conclusion I would draw from this is that Catholics who say that atheists are less moral than Catholics are at best making unsupported and offensive allegations, at worst hypocrites and liars.

 

[Nacho45]

No, it is more than that. In many, if not most, western countries Catholics make up a greater percentage of the prison population than they do of the general population. So Catholics actually do break the law more than the average.

See for example this article:

In contrast, atheists make up a much lower proportion of the prison population than they do of the general population.

The only conclusion I would draw from this is that Catholics who say that atheists are less moral than Catholics are at best making unsupported and offensive allegations, at worst hypocrites and liars.

As I said, if you have more of a specific population, it makes sense there will be more of them doing any specific thing. Not to mention, most of the Catholics you mention are not actively engaged in a life of faith and for the most part carry the title only. Again, I submit the question, where do atheists obtain their moral basis? Each one will be different because each one determines what they think morality is from their own personal perspective rather than the standard created by God.

And what exactly is “drawn to the Catholic community?”

 

[DrTaffy]

As I said, if you have more of a specific population, it makes sense there will be more of them doing any specific thing.

You miss the point. There are more Catholics in prison than would be accounted for just by their numbers in the general population. An individual Catholic, on average, is actually more likely to be in prison than a randomly chosen citizen.

Not to mention, most of the Catholics you mention are not actively engaged in a life of faith and for the most part carry the title only.

The ‘no true scotsman’ defense. Doesn’t change the fundamental statistic.

Again, I submit the question, where do atheists obtain their moral basis? Each one will be different because each one determines what they think morality is from their own personal perspective rather than the standard created by God.

As you say, individual atheists will be different because there is no essential point connecting them other than lack of belief in God.

The short answer is: none of your business. The evidence shows that they do have morals, so your insinuation that they do not is refuted, please stop saying it.

The longer version really needs a thread to itself, but in short:
The ‘true scotsman’ version of an atheist (i.e. one who agrees with me in everything) would get his morals from the laws of logic, the concept of benefit and harm, and the golden rule. Given that, you can derive a pretty complete moral code - pick up a book on ‘moral philosophy’ or ‘social philosophy’ to see how in detail.

The point about such a morality is that it is secular, not Atheist with a capital ‘A’. Everyone should be able to agree at least in principal on that code, even if private religious views then cause you amend parts of it. (e.g. a priori eating shellfish is not immoral, by the secular framework, but your holy book may say otherwise)

Contrast that with morality based on God, solely on God with no acceptance of the secular framework. What can a christian then say to dissuade a muslim suicide bomber ? Quoting the catechism won’t work, as he doesn’t value it.

Only shared (i.e. secular) moral framework allows for dialogue.

And what exactly is “drawn to the Catholic community?”

No idea. Who and what are you (apparently) quoting here?

 

[Dulcinea2721]

The problem is that morality is something that is so difficult to define. If morality is equal to law then the moral compass is societal acceptance. For example, because it is lawful to take the Lord`s name in vain (nobody will go to jail for swearing anymore) does not make it moral for me as a Catholic.

If a person would be deemed ‘immoral’ for swearing, or extra-marital sex, or cohabitation, or birth control or SSM or porn etc etc etc then it would be a different story.

I would argue that for me as a Catholic my moral compass is the teachings of Jesus through the magisterium of the CC. It would be interesting to have a study using the CCC as a moral code and see the results (not saying that Catholics would fare any better)

The only conclusion I would draw from this is that Catholics who say that atheists are less moral than Catholics are at best making unsupported and offensive allegations, at worst hypocrites and liars.

DrTaffy,

The article that you cite does not indicate the reason why the inmates were jailed. For example, if I am jailed for protesting an abortion clinic is that moral or immoral?

Secondly your article states:

The report found: "Overall, Catholics were also disproportionately represented in matters relating to prison discipline - adjudication, use of force and segregation.

"In Hydebank Wood and Maghaberry, Catholics were disproportionately unlikely, and Protestants disproportionately likely, to be granted temporary release, for healthcare, emergencies or resettlement reasons.

“It also appears to be the case at Maghaberry that Catholic prisoners are over-represented in the poorer accommodation on the ‘square houses’ and Protestants over-represented in the newer and better units.”
*

If the above statement is the only conclusion that you can draw from your article, you have been duped by your own biases. Your article lacks in many data, and can only be taken with a grain of salt.

Why are Catholics more disciplined? Why are they in lower standard accommodations? Why are they ‘disproportionately unlikely to be granted temporary leave?’?

Another conclusion that one can draw is discrimination and unfair treatment towards Catholics…just food for thought