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I’ve been having a discussion in the comments thread of Caity’s blog post on Kindness. The discussion revolves around the concept of morality: can we be ‘moral’ if there is no God?

My contention is that without the concept of God, there can be no absolute morals. By that I mean, no morals which would apply the world over. So, to take a topical example, suicide bombers could not be said to be acting immorally because they believe that it is right and moral for them to do so. There is no ultimate standard by which we can make value judgements on morality, therefore claiming that someone else’s action is immoral is actually illogical because you are only making judgements based on your own standard.

All of this hasn’t yet reached the point of Christian morality: all I’m doing is pointing out what I perceive to be inconsistencies in atheistic morals, and not defending Christianity as such.

However, Caity pointed out this quiz on Biblical morals, and I suggested that the writers of the quiz have got their theology wrong. She invited me to follow up this comment with something more detailed, so as a result that’s what I’m going to try and do.

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… Now stop worrying and enjoy life. This is the slogan from the atheist bus campaign – although it’s been in the news for a while, it is starting today. It was brought to my attention my Anne-Marie’s excellent blog post earlier today.

I always found this statement to be quite funny. “Probably” no God? Most atheists I’ve talked with on the matter are more convinced than that. Although I believe the original wording was supposed to say something like ‘almost certainly’ but for some reason they had to change it. The other thing is, it implies that people who do hold religious conviction are worrying and not enjoying life. That doesn’t seem to be my experience – but maybe I’ll come onto that.

It does seem ironic that the bus campaign should be starting now, when we are in the midst of a financial crisis. The slogan brings to mind the parable of the rich fool. This parable tells the story of a man who was rich in this life, but spiritually poor. He selfishly stored up goods for himself, and didn’t worry about God.

Does this sound familiar? I think a lot of the problems we’re in have come from greed. Too many individuals and companies have acted greedily, trying to make as much money as possible. Storing up goods for themselves. The thing is, I think this is a consequence of not believing in God and “enjoying life”, as the bus campaign puts it. OK, so the financial crisis is a very exaggerated version of it, but it still remains that if there is no God and no accountability then people can pretty much behave exactly as they want and there are no repercussions other than what you might have in this life. So, really, if you’re the right kind of person you can get away with murder (sometimes literally), and there will be no justice.

I don’t think a message like that is going to go down too well in the current climate. And it certainly doesn’t provide a reason for us not to worry and enjoy life! But this is what I found interesting: immediately after the parable of the rich fool, Jesus says these famous words:

Then Jesus said to his disciples: “Therefore I tell you, do not worry about your life, what you will eat; or about your body, what you will wear. Life is more than food, and the body more than clothes. Consider the ravens: They do not sow or reap, they have no storeroom or barn; yet God feeds them. And how much more valuable you are than birds! Who of you by worrying can add a single hour to his life? Since you cannot do this very little thing, why do you worry about the rest?
…
“Do not be afraid, little flock, for your Father has been pleased to give you the kingdom. Sell your possessions and give to the poor. Provide purses for yourselves that will not wear out, a treasure in heaven that will not be exhausted, where no thief comes near and no moth destroys.”

That’s strange! People of religion are apparently worriers and don’t enjoy life. But Christians are told not to worry! That God will provide! (Surely a much more appropriate message given the financial situation). Of course, we are not promised riches, or lots of material goods – but we do at least have the hope of heaven, and that justice will be done (“will not the God of all the earth do right?”).

Jesus came not to make us feel guilty and force us to do things we don’t want to do. He came to liberate us, to give us hope. I think the Christian message is the most powerful message in the world, and it’s more relevant than ever. Hope is a powerful thing, and I think the atheist bus campaign is rather underestimating it.

Hmmm, this blog post has ended up being a tad different to how I envisioned it. Guess that’s why it’s a bit rambling and incoherent… like every other one of my blog posts :p Apologies to Anne-Marie for nicking her idea.

I mentioned in a previous post the debate held between Christopher Hitchens and Alister McGrath. To be completely honest, I think Christopher Hitchens presented the more persuasive arguments – I think McGrath is more of a preacher and a writer than a debater! I just came across a series of letters (well, emails) between Christopher Hitchens and a theologian called Douglas Wilson.

In my opinion Douglas Wilson does a much better job of defending Christianity against Christopher Hitchen’s accusations!

I have yet to actually write a response to any of the atheist debates / articles I’ve read – mainly because there are so many already written! I might still get around to it someday, though…

Sam Harris is requesting people complete surveys on his website. You are requested to complete a survey (there’s more than one of them) if you are either (a) an atheist, (b) a dedicated Christian.

The reason I’m posting this here is because I think with a lot of these surveys, the only people who bother responding are (a) atheists, (b) Christians who I wouldn’t agree with on a lot of things.

I know there are a few Christians who read this blog who I do agree with on a lot of things, hopefully by filling out the surveys it will give them a more balanced view :-)

I recently watched (or at least listened to) a debate between Alister McGrath and Richard Dawkins, which you can find on here if you would also like to watch it. One of the things which Richard Dawkins mentions there, and also Christopher Hitchens mentioned in his debate with McGrath which I mentioned earlier, is the quite fundamental question: “Does God intervene?”

Dawkins, in this debate, gives the example of a natural disaster where tens of thousands of people are killed, except one child is saved. The parents of that child then thank God for saving that child. Dawkins asks whether God did actually save that one child – and if he did, why did he not save the others?

This, for me, was probably the strongest of Dawkins’ points in this debate, and in general one of the toughest questions to answer. Does God intervene, and if so, why does he not intervene more often? And if not, why not?

I’ve been trying to think over the past couple of days how I would answer these questions – specifically about the issue of God ‘intervening’, or not. I can’t claim that the following will be particularly clever or coherent, it’s just me trying to make sense of a jumbled mess of thoughts! With that disclaimer, here we go.

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I’ve just found a link on Richard Dawkins’ website to a video of a debate between Christopher Hitchens and Alister McGrath. Christopher Hitchens is the author of a book entitled “God Is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything”, which I believe they were discussing (I didn’t bother reading the introduction, I skipped straight to the meaty stuff!).

I’ve watched the first half (Hitchens’ and McGrath’s first talks) and I just have one or two comments to make about what Christopher Hitchens said. The gist of what he was saying basically amounted to: “misrepresent what Christianity says, and then proceed to knock that down”. According to Google, his analysis is based on “… a close and erudite reading of the major religious texts”. I can only assume that he’s not reading the same religious texts (the Bible) that I am, or knows something I don’t!

I’ll keep watching when I can, and if I get time I’d like to post up a proper response, but then maybe I should just buy the book!

Last night, I heard a talk by Andy Saville about “The God Delusion” by Richard Dawkins. Now, I will admit up-front that I haven’t actually read “The God Delusion”… I have, however, read through a couple of articles on the subject as well as listening to Andy’s talk. I don’t think you necessarily need to read the book in order to understand the arguments presented in it, although of course please correct me if I am misrepresenting Dawkins at any point!

The main argument of the book seems to be based around the ‘Who made God?’ argument. If what I have been reading is correct, the argument goes something like this:

1. Everything complex starts from something simple
2. Only evolution can create complexity from simplicity
3. If there is a God he would be more complex than his creation
4. A complex God must have evolved

And, just to prove that I’m not completely pulling this out of nowhere, see this quote:

any creative intelligence, of sufficient complexity to design anything, comes into existence only as the end product of an extended process of gradual evolution. Creative intelligences, being evolved, necessarily arrive late in the universe, and therefore cannot be responsible for designing it. God… is a delusion.

In the above line of reasoning, points (1) and (4) are assumed rather than argued. God, by very definition, surely, cannot have evolved. How can a being who exists outside of time, who created the universe ex nihilo (from nothing), have evolved? It just doesn’t make sense!

Dawkins also puts forward a few supporting arguments as well. For example, he says that Darwinian evolution disproves the God hypothesis. Well… forgive me, but I don’t think it does! The argument goes something like this:

1. The design argument is the main argument for God;
2. Evolution explains the illusion of design;
3. Therefore God is unnecessary, and probably non-existent.

This seems to me to boil down to the whole “Science vs Religion” argument, which has been thoroughly debunked by many scientists and theologians. For example, try “Rebuilding the Matrix” by Denis Alexander, or “Dawkins’ God” by Alister McGrath (I’ve mentioned it here before).

There are a few other arguments but, to be honest, those have all been covered elsewhere (as have the ones which I have mentioned) so there’s no need to go into it too much.

The only other thing I’d like to mention is one thing that Dawkins says, on Jesus: ‘there is no good evidence that he ever thought he was divine.’ Really? Searching for “was jesus divine” turned this up as the first result.

Aaaaanyway. I’ve rambled on for long enough now. I think the best thing, if you’re interested, is to have a read of one of the following books, they have a far more detailed critique of Dawkins than I could ever give!

“The Dawkins Letters” by David Robertson
“The Dawkins Delusion” by Alister McGrath (to whom I apologise for shamelessly nicking the title for the title of this blog post)
Also “Dawkins’ God” by McGrath is good, although it was written before “The God Delusion” and deals with Dawkins’ earlier books.