Do you agree or disagree with this statement and why?

Question

"If we didn't live in a secular world, and if people didn't fear God, no one would have any moral value"

Personal note~
Someone recently said this to me and I thought it was one of the most ignorant things I've heard in a long time.

Answer 1

I believe the devout evangelical types would go crazy and do a lot of damage if not for the threat of damnation hanging over their heads, but that would be only a small percentage of people who would lose moral restraints if they realized their religion is a farce. Well, let's hope it would be a small percentage.

Among sane people, "morality" is not a synonym for "religious values".

Answer 2

Ditto on the "doesn't make sense" remark. The two terms contradict each other. Maybe the person was trying to say, if we lived in a secular world and people didn't fear God. But, even though I am Christian, I don't believe that to be true. People can and do live in a secular world, without any fear of God whatsoever, and yet they are very moral people. People can want to do good and accomplish many great things without God in their lives. Happens all the time. And the other side of that argument is true. People can know God and still screw up royally. Sadly, that too happens all the time.

Answer 3

The statement itself if flawed...

If we didn't live in a secular world? OK, so what kind would we live in? If we didn't fear God, that doesn't jive with not living in a secular world...

If the question were stated better, I might agree with it.

If there was no God and if we really did evolve from bacteria and life and history really was all a product of chance, then I seriously doubt we would have any high moral value.

I would expect an aethist to disagree, as they believe the aforementioned outline is how we came to be and there are obviously moral principles in the world today....

Nothing is really solved by this particular discussion. Calling people ignorant who do not see eye to eye with you on a hypothetical IS IGNORANT.

Answer 4

Morals can exist outside of religion. Religion provides a framework for these morals, and sometimes more incentive (i.e. afterlife) for people to behave. However, lots of people who are God-Fearing-Whatevers can be the most immoral people in the world. A lot of wars are started in the name of various Gods, and this doesn't seem to be very moral.

A secular world doesn't mean everyone is an Atheist. America is supposed to be secular, but it's one of the last industrialized nations that has a big religious population. Being secular doesn't mean being without religion but it ensures that those who have religion won't be persecuted or disadvantaged. It protects both those who do not have religion as well as those who do!

Answer 5

I have been sitting here looking at it.. It finally made it though my thick head.. I think... If we had no fear of the of men or the Law of God would we have any morals at all... I think that is what it means.. I believe men will do both bad and good. The good we have to be taught, the bad we do naturally. So in the world this person asked about what would we be.. I say about the same....

Answer 6

That is ignorant. There are many that do not fear a god or any of her consequences and have higher moral values than the majority of people.

Warren Buffet and Bill Gate's charity comes to mind.

There has been many immoral acts committed in the name of god.

Answer 7

False assumptions in there:
1. Anyone who does not believe in God is immoral.
2. People are only moral because they fear God.
3. People are inherently bad and need religion to force them to be good.

Not only does it rip on non-God-believers but it even rips on the Christian faith, giving the idea it only runs on fear.

Pretty ignorant and narrow-minded all the way around.

Answer 8

No, I most certainly do not. In fact, I think that the man-made concept of "fear of God" has made us more immoral and intolerant than just about anything in history. If we all knew that God loved us all unconditionally, how much better would we treat each other? How much less human condemnation would there be? It could have eliminated all the so-called "Holy" wars in history.

Answer 9

Yep... that's pretty ignorant, all right. Whenever I see a question like this, I am appalled to be reminded that there exists people who are so out of touch with their basic humanity, and reality, that they would not have any idea how to conduct themselves in society, absent the written code of an imaginary supernatural being, based on the myths, superstitions, fairy tales and fantastical delusions of an ignorant bunch of Bronze Age fishermen and wandering goat herders.

Cooperation and altruism are innate properties of human existence... a more sophisticated version of the social organization that you can see among pods of orcas, packs of wolves, lion prides and troops of chimpanzees. Moral consensus, moral conscience and mutual empathy are evolved survival traits. These are evolved social constructs... the social lubrication that allows people to exist together. People come away with the misconception that they don't exist, absent religion. The religious puppet masters try to perpetuate that idea, in order to protect their conduits to wealth and power... but that is a canard. This has to do, entirely, with human nature.

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"With or without religion, you would have good people doing good things and evil people doing evil things. But for good people to do evil things, that takes religion." ~ Steven Weinberg
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Answer 10

You can look at this from two sides

Maybe they wouldnt because they were all alike they all loved god so then they were all the same and none of them were worth anything (thats a persons veiw im sure gods veiw would be differnt because)
in heavan thats how it is (and God LOVES it) so No i dont think thats true but other people might