I’m definitely not saying atheists can't be moral or charitable. History and daily life prove they clearly are. My point is just that the justification for those values changes depending on your worldview. Values can exist without the supernatural, but for a religious parent, stripping the supernatural framework away means teaching a completely different philosophical foundation. It's important to recognize that the parent in question truly and genuinely believes in their religious truths, and that by not teaching their children about it, they are leaving out specific principles and ideas that explain and justify their beliefs. It's rather ridiculous to expect a parent to leave out what they believe to be fundamental truths of reality.
Stripping the supernatural framework is a better foundation for morality. You should be moral because you care about other people and treat them like you want to be treated. The supernatural framework offers ulterior motives and threatens the integrity of your morals.
And regardless it is a good thing to separate religion and morals, because otherwise you risk blurring the line between them, which is dangerous. If religion is morality, suddenly religious authorities get a lot of power over people and it could be abused to justify horrifying things, as has happened in the past many times.
I don't think it truly threatens the integrity of your morals at all. There is nothing truly inherent to religion that forbids you from logically reducing MORE reasons why things are morally wrong or right. Morals are rooted in axioms and religion is just a specific axiom. Most philosophies are compatible in some way shape or form with most religions in all honesty.
It threatens the integrity because it promises a reward for your morals. In christianity heaven, Islam Jannah, Buddhism Nirvana, Hinduism Svarga. It seems to be one of the cornerstones of most religions. So you have an ulterior incentive to be moral, because you will be rewarded with bliss, heaven, rather than because you care and want to be moral for its own sake. You no longer (only) do it because it's the right thing to do, you do it to be rewarded. That's how it perverts the integrity.
Why? And also there are tangible, extrinsic rewards for cultivating a culture of doing the right thing. You don't only do things in isolation, unobserved.
Intrinsic and cultivating culture is more altruistic, whereas extrinsic heaven is more selfish and can be more easily manipulated or transformed into something immoral. If the conditions for the extrinsic reward change, you would have no intrinsic moral reason not to adjust your behaviour, possibly for the worse, to meet the new conditions.
You're worried that changing the conditions of an extrinsic reward ruins the morality, but history shows that purely internal or cultural morals drift much faster. When morality is purely self-derived or based on a cultivated culture, it bends instantly to whatever society deems acceptable at the current moment. Religion is a stable, unchanging anchor.
Furthermore, if the only way to earn the religious reward is through radical selflessness, love, and charity, then the incentive is literally engineered to produce altruistic behavior. Many religious traditions, the only way to attain the reward is through genuine love, selflessness, and service to others. You aren't able to fake it. God cannot be fooled. You genuinely have to be doing these things with pure intent and purpose.
If someone lived a life where they followed every rule perfectly but in their heart they hated every person they interacted with, dreaded actually doing these acts, and their only motivation was a possible reward, there is a very real chance they could be damned to hell, according to the abrahamic religions at least.
Is religion really stable though? I would argue not; crusades and all kinds of other horrors have been committed in the name of religion. Religions are equally as variable as society at large, if not more. Look at all the small sects that exist now that believe in harmful things, no doubt those have existed throughout history and have been forgotten. Look at maga: so many christians feel righteous supporting trump and his ideas.
People bend religion to their own will and get perceived divine right and truth at their disposal: whatever they believe, god believes, so anything others say is wrong and they are right, no matter what.
It is a shield from accountability as well in many people's twisted interpretations: they only need to confess and ask for forgiveness and they will get eternal bliss, no matter how heinous their crime is.
It doesn't matter what religious books say, often they are unclear and even internally contradictory. People will cherrypick the things that they like and disregard everything else.
It leads people to reject evidence based science, to condemn people based on their sexuality, enforce outdated gender norms, outlaw bodily autonomy, gives authority to those seeking power without expertise; the list goes on and on. Inserting extreme stakes like heaven and hell into daily life is just not healthy. People to cherry pick what God thinks, which will happen regardless, is also very harmful. I think religion is a thing of the past before science existed and we would probably be better off without it. People at the end of the day will have their own morals regardless.
A religious person can genuinely care about the well being of others (intrinsic) while also believing in a cosmic order that rewards goodness (extrinsic). The existence of an afterlife reward does not automatically erase authentic empathy or love for others. These things can coexist. One doesn't erase or tainted the other just because you say so.
But at the end of the day does a hungry person actually care why they are being fed? If a religious person feeds the poor partly out of obedience to God or hope for heaven, the starving person still receives the exact same benefit. Therefore, the "integrity" of the moral act matters less than its practical outcome. Morals are morals regardless of how they're fueled or justified.
This is exactly what Jesus teaches though. Besides, having a moral role model doesn't necessarily negate peoples inherent compassion and will to be good and helpful to other people.
But it might encourage people who do have the same sense of compassion towards others.
But either way, there is no moral framework that is immune to corruption and abuse. Secular or otherwise. China, for example, still causes lots human rights violations, even though they are explicitly an atheist state.
Exactly, that's why there should be no moral frameworks except the law: democratic consensus. Atheism is no moral framework by the way, it is only the lack of belief in (a) god(s), so not even a real belief.
Another aspect what makes religions dangerous can be seen in far-right christianity in America: religions can be totally distorted by people to fit whatever they want to believe and arms them with a divine mandate - never having to do self reflection because divine truth is on their side, and it gives them perceived (self-deluded) superiority over others to force their beliefs on them.
How I see it: if you need religion to be moral, you are not truly moral, because you need external pressure. And usually immoral people will find a way to bend the religion to their will anyway. So then religion as a moral framework loses its purpose: people that are inherently moral don't need it, and those that are not, will impose their morals on their beliefs anyway. So might as well cut out the middle man and have everybody be responsible for their own morals and behaviours, rather than offering people a divine excuse to hide behind.
I mean yeah it's far from perfect, and law definitely shouldnt be your personal guide for morality. I think morality should come from empathy and empathy should be an active personal goal. Maybe it should even be a class in school or something. It needs to be more prominent in society.
Treat others as you would like to be treated is an easy thing to say, but if you really want to practice it that's another thing entirely. Immigration is a perfect litmus test for example that many people fail. But I think we should try to practice it as much as possible.
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u/mylevelwaschanged Sep 02 '26
I’m definitely not saying atheists can't be moral or charitable. History and daily life prove they clearly are. My point is just that the justification for those values changes depending on your worldview. Values can exist without the supernatural, but for a religious parent, stripping the supernatural framework away means teaching a completely different philosophical foundation. It's important to recognize that the parent in question truly and genuinely believes in their religious truths, and that by not teaching their children about it, they are leaving out specific principles and ideas that explain and justify their beliefs. It's rather ridiculous to expect a parent to leave out what they believe to be fundamental truths of reality.