My New Struggle

[Aliix]

Imagine for a moment that you journeying across an oppressive sub-Saharan Desert. In the midst of a seemingly ceaseless sandstorm, while the stinging winds and sands strike and numb your face, there is a seemingly endless and monotonous landscape, barren of any distinguishing features which could assure you of your orientation. Throughout this enduring tribulation, however, you have a reliable map in your possession, which depicts a vivid and meticulously detailed guide to your ultimate destination. Suddenly, though, you come to the realization that this guide has been incorrect the entire time. For numerous months you have been traveling in vain; in an entirely arbitrary direction. As the winds increase with ferocity, your mind becomes progressively disoriented until thoughts of perplexity dominate it almost entirely.

 

 

 

 

 

This metaphor speaks directly to a current situation I am in. The Bible, my map, once an absolute provenance for my morality; has been discarded because I have left Christianity. Now, as one would feel lost in a desert, I feel extremely adrift.

 

I realize I have received a reply on this topic my introduction thread, however I was hoping for other opinions as well. I suppose I should ask what all other non-Christians on this board base their morality on.

[OpheliaGinger]

Sandstorms are never endless--there will be moments of calm clarity for you to assess your position.

[PaulQ]

You've always been adrift; you're just aware of it now. The difference is that you are now free to plot your own course in life. As for morality, check out:

 

http://www.mwillett.org/atheism/moralsource.htm

http://everything2.com/title/How+can+an+atheist+have+morals%253F

[Vigile]

Your metaphor was well written but unfortunately it's not apt. It's understandable why you would choose such a metaphor, but the reason you did resides within the paradigm if xianity.

 

Morality is formed from empathy, from societal and homelife experience and indoctrination, from trial and error, and from assumptions that are arrived at logically or otherwise.

 

Introducing a guide or resource such as the bible to come to grips with what is/isn't moral is essentially trying to manually adjust that which is already running in automatic mode.

 

The answer to your dillema is much simpler than you might think or perhaps want it to be. Operating on the assumption that there is no final judgement and no natural laws of right and wrong, all you really need to do is not be a bad member of society. This entails just not doing anything that hurts others. How does the old saw go? Everything is permissable but not everything is beneficial?

[Vigile]

The bottom line is, now that you have deconverted, you have the ability to reassess those things in your mind that you were raised to believe. Some things will likely stay and others you can toss out. You don't have to look to a book to decide, and IMO, you are much better off if you don't adopt a new paradigm through which to assess things either. Rigidity just causes people to come up with nonsensical conclusions to dynamic situations. You're a smart guy, you'll figure it out as you go along.

[RabbleRabble]

Morality is formed from empathy, from societal and homelife experience and indoctrination, from trial and error, and from assumptions that are arrived at logically or otherwise.

 

Introducing a guide or resource such as the bible to come to grips with what is/isn't moral is essentially trying to manually adjust that which is already running in automatic mode.

 

Well said. To play into your metaphor....

 

You have lost the map you were clinging to and look up to realize that there was a path in front of you all along!

 

Christianity does nothing but confuse morality with a set of arbitrary and inflexible guidelines from two thousand years ago. Why should you need someone else to tell you what is wrong or right? A big sky daddy to spank your bottom for not being good.

 

At some point during your deconversion you had to ask yourself "Am I justified in the beliefs I hold?" Why not carry that questioning a step further? As a moral or ethical issue comes up just ask yourself how you feel about it and why.

 

When you take religious ideas out of the picture most people will come up with very similar answers. Don't they have a name for those who do not.... I think it's "sociopath"

[HRDWarrior]

My boss and I were actually having this discussion the other day. She was insisting that religion provides the moral compass for people, I was arguing that it did not. Her question then was, well, what decides morality? Where does it come from?

 

My reply to her was that there are some basic "morals" in all humans - that there are some things we instinctively know are "bad" such as murder, lying, stealing, etc. Most of these universal morals can be seen in nearly every culture throughout history regardless of religion. Then once the biggies are out of the way, society/culture provide another set of morals for us - some of these will vary by the culture but irregarless provide a basic framework for the members of that society to function on a similar level. Then we have the influences of parents, friends, and other emotional-based relationships that again gave us ideas of right and wrong. Religion can feed into a number of these places, but in no way does one religion provide a moral basis for people - it merely provides a guilt trip on why you should do it. Every society and culture has a set of morals, and I would dare say a vast majority of them are NOT based on the Bible - which for me proved that we don't need some book to tell us right and wrong, it is programmed into our species, just like chasing squirrels is programmed into my dog.

 

IMO, I would much rather have someone help me because they wanted to - not because they felt like they were "supposed" to do it to make their imaginary god happy.

[Guest Davka]

The desert is an illusion. Before you got hold of your map, you didn't believe you were in a desert. But then you read the map, and it had this big arrow pointing to the desert that says "you are here." And you believed it.

 

The sandstorm is artificial. The heat is from heat-lamps. Now that you've stopped following the map, it's time to walk away from the artificial desert and go into the real world.

 

I suppose I should ask what all other non-Christians on this board base their morality on.

 

I base mine on the kind of world I want to live in, and the kind of people I want to inhabit that world. I then try to be one of those people, building that kind of world.

 

And I don't kick myself for failing, because I don't want to live in a world full of people who kick themselves for failure.

 

[Aliix]

Perhaps you are correct. It is Christianity which taught me that I would be lost without it, it is this mentality which has taken hold. Not that I am Christian, I'm certainly not, however; many concepts one is programmed with when they are younger tend to cement themselves until the person steps away and realizes what is reality. That sounds very plausible.