Reach for your goal. Reach for the stars. Chase your dreams. Since our childhood, most of us have been inundated with philosophy that everything we want to achieve is outside rather than in. That life is about finding ways to get what we want. It is consumerism dressed up in the fads achieving our personal potential. If you grew up in the Christian Church for example, you get taught that ‘God’s mysterious will’ is nowhere near. That his will is somewhere out there. That our lives are about guessing at where his will is and what its supposed to look like. But even outside the confines of claustrophobic Christianity there is this life message that whatever we’re searching is completely and utterly separate from us. I think we have also come to do the same with morality.

We’ve gotten it in our heads that morality is a plumbline we grapple for or wrestle others over.  But what if morality is deeper than something that’s out there? What if morality has been ingrained within us? Maybe somewhere deep down embedded in the acids of our DNA is the coding for morality. Somehow people know at a very young age that stealing is wrong. Most people can try to explain it away as parental nurture, but there is more to it than that. Or that we can go to any country in the world and somewhere somehow we all know that killing is destructive behaviour.

For some, morality is something that is either taught, learned or gained through familial contact or social interaction. Yet there are people who didn’t have good parents or no parents at all and grew up without much social interaction or exposure to accessible information and yet can interact with a culture and still know the basic ‘rules’ fo morality. For others, morality seems to be something we have to achieve to or earn. That the more we do the more moral we become. If that’s true, than morality has always been a commodity we can purchase. Then morality sits in our hotel vending machines waiting for us to choose it.

But, morality isn’t a rule. It isn’t a plumbline. It isn’t a tool to determine who is in and who is out. It is something that part of each person. We don’t earn morality. It earns us. The more in touch with our humanity we become the more moral we become. Morality is a gene. But not a gene that we can see or study. Its a gene that progressively evolves over time, but unlike any other gene it is effected and altered by the decisions we make and don’t make. It is transformed by compassion and deformed by the lack of it.

Morality isn’t a characteristic that was somehow born out of the ancient Christian scriptures. It wasn’t birthed out of the introduction of evolution. It isn’t a course you can take at a university. There’s no degree you can get in morality. Morality is in us. We are all moral. Its how we choose to use that knowledge that will determine how we nurture the growth of that morality within us. So, the origins of morality lie in each human being but are grown through the intentional everyday process of making choices.

If morality is subjective than is there a plumbline is the first apparent question? If there is a plumbline it is found in a multi-systemic worldview. Morals are encouraged by living in a moral society or community. They are also spurred on by what we choose to expose our minds to. Moral subjectivity is not the enemy to the progress of any society, the enemy is when homogenous morality is used as way to marginalize people into our neat little boxes. Moral subjectivity leads a society to embrace diversity by seeing that their worldview isn’t the only right one. Moral homogeneity says everyone needs to see everything the same.

Now the problem comes when someone thinks that their moral worldview is much more valuable than the person standing next them. The moment that moral subjectivity becomes moral superiority is when things like the Holocaust or the Crusades leave open scars on our history. Events like this instill just enough fear in people that to even hear words like ‘moral subjectivity’ force them to cringe at the next global episode likely to occur because of such terminology.  Most tend to blame the development of such atrocious acts on the lack of parenting skills or chock it up to bad highschool experiences. For the most part people tend to blame events outside of the perpetrators life to help explain why they are the way are. But maybe its deeper than attempting to victimize those that have made historically destructive decisions.

Decisions belong to those who make them. The after-effects of someone’s decision are the life-long souvenirs they will carry with them. And those souvenirs are indicative of the origins of where they learned to make moral choices. If the origins of moral subjectivity lie in the heart of a person than no longer can people blame outside unseen forces. If moral subjectivity is true than one can only blame themselves. This is an incredibly empowering discovery because than it means that everyone is responsible to developm morality in light of their journey. This doesn’t mean that there aren’t objective morals to follow, it means that our development can remain subjective all the searching for the objective. That we don’t have to push, pull and prod our way through the library to find the one book that teaches us how to be all things moral. This reality leaves us with a responsibility not only to choose progress but to help one another on our journey, and by doing so we help usher in a new morality that is much needed in light of our current cultural shift.

most people render this verse to be a universal proclamation of the depravity and falleness of man. that we are all going to ‘hell in a handbasket’. but is that what is being said?

i think its important to remember that the majority of the time when paul uses a ‘you’ in his letters he isn’t directing the ‘you’ to those outside his audience, he is directing it to the readers/hearers. or even what some might call universal proclamations tend to not include the universe within which most traditional theology sets the stage for universal depravity. take for example the first few words — ‘for all’ — which the word in greek for this phrase is better rendered ‘for all of those who’. paul is dealing with a specific issue, he is also referring to an older set of scriptures, more specifically to the verse in the OT where God supposedly tells the nation of Israel that not one among you is good (there’s that ‘you’ showing up again; remember God wasn’t talking to the world, he was speaking thr0ugh a prophet to the Israelite followers). Paul is relating this terminology to make a point that this new grace that the Romans are receiving isn’t cheap grace. It comes with an inherited experience. A inherited family that they are not a part of. Then Paul goes on to talk about the idea of sin. remember the word is singular, not epidemic. and two it is directly related to personal journey that is experienced and sought out throughout our life. so he is tell them that no one in their community is who they should be. (because there were some in the community who thought they were better than others because they thought following  jesus was all about the law — this is why Paul says before and after these verses that everyone has been made right. Paul is dealing with this destructive spirit of exclusivity here. some were saying only those who follow the list of the right things to do are good enough to call themselves followers. Paul nips that whole way of thinking in the bud by cutting out the legs from underneath those who have gotten too big of a head for the group they are a part of.

the next section is this idea of falling short. the word in the greek is hystereo. it means ‘lack’. deeply rooted in the origin of the word is this idea where the effect in the cause lags behind. so instead of having a cause and effect, one right after the other, the results don’t come immediately or directly after the cause. it would be like putting some money in a vending machine and making your selection and then coming back the next day to get your selection. or using paints to paint a picture, but the picture itself doesn’t show up until hours later. it is this idea that people haven’t caught up with they are meant to be. that we are learning what it means to follow christ. everyone. not just a few. and that no one can pull rank. in fact, the word also connotes a sort of partnership. so paul is actually chastising those who are trying to be exclusive by challenging them to see that by being exclusive they are partnering with their lack, they are partnering with the ‘who’ they are not meant to be. and by doing so, they don’t make god famous (which is the idea behind the hebrew word for glory). that we don’t draw people to jesus when we think we are better than others. and a good reminder is to see that we all need jesus. Paul goes into the atonement theology on the verses between these two. but the point is clear, exclusivism stops us from being who we are meant to be.

a really good friend of mine who is an atheist shares his thoughts on bacon, god, and how christians and atheists could work together. here is his article.

                                                                                                                                                                                                          by James Millar.

 
I USED to be a vegetarian – but bacon frying in the pan smells so good doesn’t it?  It was a life choice based on the basic principle that I did not want consume a sentient being. A personal choice – a personal view. However, I was always surprised by the confrontational response I would generally receive when I revealed this detail of my life. It was a constant irritation to me, that others seemed to feel compelled to confront my belief system head-on. With a sigh, I would brace myself, yet again, for a bombardment of hackneyed counter-arguments. Not that they ever managed to shake my personal conviction that my choice was the right one for me.
My vegetarianism has now lapsed, but I still try and eat food which has been ethically sourced and have a great sympathy with the compelling arguments put forward for vegetarianism – maybe in the future I’ll be a veggie again, sausages taste so good though.
The reason I bring this up is like vegetarianism, atheism, seems to evoke a similar response. I have for many years held the belief that there was no god, no higher being guiding life, no holy spirit, that we are just animals, like any other inhabiting the world. A result of evolution – no less no more.
My name is James and I am an atheist.
There I’ve said it….I’m out the closet, because ever since I’ve held this viewpoint I have tended to keep it to myself. Perhaps it’s because I find the sight of atheist heavyweight Richard Dawkins, attempting to intellectually bludgeon the religious community slightly unsettling. I’m not driven by trying to impose my viewpoint on others, frankly I don’t care enough. But then I expect my beliefs to be respected and I don’t want to be hammered by religious dogma either.
I understand the hostility to my world view.

 Atheism calls into question one of the core beliefs of those with a religions conviction. The atheist doesn’t get ‘faith’ I’m afraid, he is needs convincing with scientific fact. Basically, if the argument is conceded that there is no intelligent design, no heaven and hell, no higher being guiding us through life then the house of cards collapses. If I had spent my life believing in God I might react in a similar fashion. 

Never the twain shall meet then?

I think not, there is common ground. There is a dialogue to be opened up here. I doubt there will ever be any concession on the diametrically opposing views of the existence or not of God. But I think Christians and Atheists do have a lot in common. Both have spent time pondering the big questions in life – where do we come from, why are we here, what happens when we die. More importantly though I think, both believe in promoting and nourishing the inherent goodness of the human race. Put simply; we believe that people should be good to each other.  I feel this, as a belief is far more important than a debate on the existence of a higher being. I would equally lack interest in a debate on whether fairies live at the bottom of the garden, I don’t mean to be offensive, that’s how I feel about it.
The only way in my view that the two can progress, is to leave that debate at the doorstep, and talk about humanist philosophy. I want to be decent, kind and honest to my fellow humans, not so I’m in God’s good graces, but because it feels good and I know on a fundamental level it is the right thing to do. But whatever the drive; those who care about helping others should come together, talk, take action and try and make this a world we are not ashamed to hand over to our children. Bacon’s burning, got to go!