How Does Belief In God Make You A Good Person?

[smellincoffee]

"You're a good person, you believe in God" is an annoying statement. It's false, but most people consider it to be true -- and just as often, they consider the reverse to be true, that if you don't believe in God that you're a bad person. Every single person who has ever mistreated me professed to be a God-fearing bible-thumping Christian. Furthermore, I cannot think of a single time where I have been abused in any way by a skeptic or a freethinker.

 

Even if belief in God DID correspond to a "goodness" factor, belief in the Christian god would be detrimental -- he's a petty, abusive, vindictive tyrant who has severe narcissitic tendecies and is terribly insecure. Freud would have a field day with him.

[Onyx]

Guilt trips, bigotry and ill equipped personality led to that bullshit you call "The Good Fundie Christian." Thank Thor that I left Christianity...

[Amethyst]

Of course, religious belief doesn't make you a good person. That's just the brainwashing talking. Sadly, I know plenty of people who think along the lines of "belief in any god is better than no belief at all."

[Jun]

Every single person who has ever mistreated me professed to be a God-fearing bible-thumping Christian.

 

Hear hear. I have to second that.

[Everglaze]

Yep and don't forget that those same Christians are probably the same people that think with "God" comes "good" morals. If they have kids or are planning to have kids, they're all talking about how they want to raise their kids as Christians in a "good" family with "good" values/morals of a "good" "God."

[Astreja]

And I'm sure we can find at least one person who says both "You're a good person, you believe in God" and "We are all sinners."

 

Cognitive dissonance. Oughta be a law against it.

[Lycorth]

Every single person who has ever mistreated me professed to be a God-fearing bible-thumping Christian.

 

Hear hear. I have to second that.

 

And I third it. All of the biggest jackasses I've ever personally crossed swords with professed some sort of strong allegiance to Xianity. "Xian faith" automatically equalling "upstanding morality" my hairy white Polish ass

[Legion]

I suppose the thing I want to ask is, what is a good person?

 

I've heard it said that a belief in God has a tendency to make one less vain. I don't know if that may generally be true or not. Are believers less vain than non-believers? I certaily don't believe that faith in God necessarily makes one moral.

[riverbank]

I think it depends on the nature of the person. If someone is say, a murderer, a drug dealer, generally what the world would consider a "bad person", and then suddenly "finds God", it can be a life changing experience and change that person for the better.

 

But, generally speaking, christians aren't particularly different in terms of moral standards to your average non-religious person. Some christians can still be assholes, whilst probably thinking that they are morally superior or different just because they don't swear so much or because they "have God".

 

I thought I'd end up a bad person once i knew i was on my way out of christianity. I swear a lot more now and probably have more anger issues, but other than that, my morals aren't that different to what they were. The christians i know who are decent people, are just decent people, and not just because they're christians.

[Stratovarius]

Morality comes from within, not from without. No believer can argue that the bible says abhorrent things. They choose to ignore it; what does that mean? It means they ignored it based on their morality.

 

I tend to think religion can bring out your true self more or less. There are people who adhere to Christianity and are serial killers that carve bible verses on people's backs. Then there are people who are believers and are just plain good people.