Morality without God?

[Publisher]

I think you are mistaking the utterances of sinful Catholic men with that which the deposit of faith given to the Catholic Church.

No, I’m not…I said the phrase had Catholic origins…men authorized to exterminate the Cathars by the authority of the Catholic church made the statment…hence of “Catholic origin”.

I’m sure you are not going to claim the Catholic church authorized no such “crusade” of extermination?

 

[Charlemagne_II]

Linux
**
You are merely stating a correlation, you are not proving that civil law is based on moral law.**

Not true. All civil law is based on moral or immoral impulses which are rooted in moral law. Prove otherwise.

Is legalised abortion based on moral law?

As indicated above, it is a violation of moral law.

Civil law is not based on Catholic Moral Dogma.

Yes it is. Generally speaking. The Ten commandments are enshrined on the Supreme Court building as a reminder of our moral roots (Catholic, Protestant, and Jewish).

Where civil law departs from Catholic moral dogma you generally find immoral (unnatural) civil laws, such as permission to kill one’s unborn child. In any case, all laws either conform to or violate the natural law, which is a Catholic principle of morality.

 

[Charlemagne_II]

Publisher

**I’m sure you are not going to claim the Catholic church authorized no such “crusade”? **

If ever there was a crusade worth authorizing, it was that one.

The Cathari were downright evil, from what I have read about them, perhaps comparable to the Thugees of India who were exterminated by the British in the 19th century. They weren’t merely heretics. They were criminals.

 

[PRmerger]

No, I’m not…I said the phrase had Catholic origins…men authorized to exterminate the Cathars by the authority of the Catholic church made the statment…hence of “Catholic origin”.

Well, it is as much an indictment of Catholicism as it is of the male species.

Could I then include you (I assume you’re male?) in this guilt?

 

[Bradski]

Render unto Caesar the things that are Caesar’s. This is because Christ allows that the law itself is rooted in right doing, but if it is not, then we must render unto God what is God’s.

Let me get this straight. Law is based on morality. Unless it isn’t. In which case it is immoral. And it is immoral to not follow the law. Unless it isn’t moral, in which case it isn’t.

So not wearing a seatbelt is immoral, unles it is a restriction on personal freedom in which case it’s not immoral. I wonder who gets to decide.

 

[Bradski]

Linux

**You are aware that there is a split between church and state? I don’t know what you mean when you say that civil law is derived from moral law. **

Examples:

Moral law: We have a moral obligation to pay our way in this world if humanly possible.
Civil law: We must pay taxes for those benefits we enjoy supplied by the government.

Moral law: “Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.”
Civil law: Obligation to fulfill contracts you have made with others.

Etc. etc.

Aren’t you being a little selective here? If you take your argument to the logical conclusion then every moral law should be entrenched in civil law. If not, then it could be said that you are just using examples where there is a connection between them.

Do you think that every aspect of morality should be legislated?

 

[Aloysium]

No, I’m not…I said the phrase had Catholic origins…men authorized to exterminate the Cathars by the authority of the Catholic church made the statment…hence of “Catholic origin”.

I’m sure you are not going to claim the Catholic church authorized no such “crusade” of extermination?

i call troll

 

[Bradski]

In any case, all laws either conform to or violate the natural law…

You’re at it again, Charles. ‘Law is based on morality. Unless it isn’t.’

 

[Publisher]

i call troll

“Troll”??? I have been a memeber of CA for a number of years…hardly a “troll”…but believe what you will…I have found that “inconvienient truths” often have the epitet of “troll” attacvhed to it here at CA.

 

[Publisher]

Well, it is as much an indictment of Catholicism as it is of the male species.

Could I then include you (I assume you’re male?) in this guilt?

Friend, you may include who you wish in your indictment…the pope authorized the extermination…the “crusaders” made the statement and carried it out…fact of history.

Holding religious beliefs does not guarantee morality…just read the atrocities the Israelites conducted upon their neighbors. “Kill every man woman and child…but you may keep the virgins for yourselves.”

 

[PRmerger]

the pope authorized the extermination…

Authorized the extermination?

the “crusaders” made the statement and carried it out…fact of history.

Sure.

But this is no more an indictment of the Catholic Church than it is against the entire male species, or against white Europeans who ride horses, or against men who wear armor.

Those who participated in the Crusades will be judged (or rather, have been judged) for their culpability.

If you want to assign this guilt to the Catholic Church then I suggest you be judicious and also assign this guilt to yourself, being that you’re a male and all that.

 

[Charlemagne_II]

Bradski

**Let me get this straight. Law is based on morality. Unless it isn’t. In which case it is immoral. **

Yes, civil law is based on morality. Morality covers questions about good and evil, the moral and the immoral. Some laws are morally good, others are morally evil. But all laws relate to morality one way or another.

Why is that so difficult for you to understand?

If you take your argument to the logical conclusion then every moral law should be entrenched in civil law.

That’s an absurd proposition which I never stated.

Do you think that every aspect of morality should be legislated?

No. Only Mayor Bloomberg thinks so, as far as I know!

 

[Bella92]

Friend, you may include who you wish in your indictment…the pope authorized the extermination…the “crusaders” made the statement and carried it out…fact of history.

Holding religious beliefs does not guarantee morality…just read the atrocities the Israelites conducted upon their neighbors. “Kill every man woman and child…but you may keep the virgins for yourselves.”

I thought it was the Abbot that authorised it but either way did the Pope condemn the murdering of all those people when he heard about it?

 

[Charlemagne_II]

Publisher

Holding religious beliefs does not guarantee morality…just read the atrocities the Israelites conducted upon their neighbors."

It is very true that holding religious belief does not guarantee the right moral choices. No doubt Satan believed in God, but that didn’t stop him from disobeying. Adam and Eve and all humans ever since, whether they believed in God or not, have sinned. The question is not whether men sin even with religion, but whether religion helps to save those who are fighting sin. And those who are without religion, exactly what help do they get in a godless world, not only to avoid sin, but to become more saintly in their lives?

Who lived the nobler life: Mother Teresa or Christopher Hitchens?

 

[Linux]

Publisher

Holding religious beliefs does not guarantee morality…just read the atrocities the Israelites conducted upon their neighbors."

It is very true that holding religious belief does not guarantee the right moral choices. No doubt Satan believed in God, but that didn’t stop him from disobeying. Adam and Eve and all humans ever since, whether they believed in God or not, have sinned. The question is not whether men sin even with religion, but whether religion helps to save those who are fighting sin. And those who are without religion, exactly what help do they get in a godless world, not only to avoid sin, but to become more saintly in their lives?

Who lived the nobler life: Mother Teresa or Christopher Hitchens?

Some would consider Christopher Hitchens as noble for not allowing himself to be emotionally brainwashed by religious assertions. They would consider him brave, but that’s because people have different understandings of what constitutes the foundation of moral value and noble behaviour.

I don’t think that you have really taken that into account. It is interesting however that people believe that there is a “right way” a “noble way” that people ought to behave; a concept that is shared by atheists as well as Christians. Christopher hicthcen believed he was morally correct; he believed in right and wrong. So it is evident to me that many Atheists take their experience of morality for granted and fail to truly consider what lies at the foundation of these experiences. The ontology of morality is an important debate.

 

[Charlemagne_II]

Linux
**
Some would consider Christopher Hitchens as noble for not allowing himself to be emotionally brainwashed by religious assertions.**

He would only be considered brave by other atheists. I consider him to have been a coward. He was afraid to confront God and routinely fled from him as fast as he could.

 

[Linux]

Linux
**
Some would consider Christopher Hitchens as noble for not allowing himself to be emotionally brainwashed by religious assertions.**

He would only be considered brave by other atheists. I consider him to have been a coward. He was afraid to confront God and routinely fled from him as fast as he could.

Of course he would have only been considered brave by atheists. If your a Catholic, then it does you no favours to believe that Hitchens was noble in his atheism.

As far as calling him a Coward fleeing from God, I don’t know that this is true, although I bet it makes you more comfortable to think so. I certainly don’t consider it true if your only grounds for saying so is the fact that he was an atheist. We are not born with knowledge of God. His existence is not self-evident and neither is it self evident that Catholicism is the true faith. Neither is it necessarily easy to see that any such thing is true.

I am a theist, and even I reject blind faith in a religion. I think its dangerous, and possibly a waste of your life.

 

[Hamlet123]

PovertyCure.org

 

[Charlemagne_II]

Linux
**
As far as calling him a Coward fleeing from God, I don’t know that this is true, although I bet it makes you more comfortable to think so.**

It gives me no comfort. While he was dying I prayed for his immortal soul. I hope in that last brief hour before he encountered eternity he summoned the courage to confront God up close and personal.

**I am a theist, and even I reject blind faith in a religion. I think its dangerous, and possibly a waste of your life. **

I am a theist, and I reject blind faith in atheism. I think it’s dangerous and a possible waste of life, as well as a waste of eternity.

 

[Publisher]

Publisher

**I’m sure you are not going to claim the Catholic church authorized no such “crusade”? **

If ever there was a crusade worth authorizing, it was that one.

The Cathari were downright evil, from what I have read about them, perhaps comparable to the Thugees of India who were exterminated by the British in the 19th century. They weren’t merely heretics. They were criminals.

“Down righ evil”…the “Good Christians” as they were called. Thousands some estimate up to a million were brutally butchered, burned, slaughtered because of their religious beliefs.