Where Do Atheists Get Morals?

Secular Morality Through The Lens Of Homosexuality And Christianity

I’ve been asked, on more than one occasion, “where do you get your morals if they don’t come from the Bible?”

And today I had a fantastic opportunity to answer this question.

A couple of friends and I have been meeting over the past few weeks to discuss different viewpoints on various topics.

We’ve named our group “The GAP” which is an acronym for the gay, the atheist, and the preacher. We aim to have deep conversations and fill “gaps” in each other’s understanding.

The topic of today’s discussion was homosexuality within Christianity.

I’m not including their perspectives on this topic because I haven’t asked their permission, and I don’t want to misrepresent them in any way unintentionally.

However, what I will write about is my perspective as “the atheist.”

The question was asked,

“Hypothetically, do you think an atheist and a preacher could come together and create rules of morality that they agreed on?”

My answer was yes which was somewhat of a surprise to one of my friends in the meeting.

I believe we could find common ground because there are portions of the Bible that encourage good morals.

For a very extreme example, we would likely agree that murder should not be allowed. This is a principle that any Bible-following preacher and I both probably share, and I’m sure there are more.

However, I believe we do not need the Bible to understand that committing murder is not something we should do. It’s evident, from living in our world, that murder has adverse effects on the majority of parties involved and doesn’t benefit society.

It’s only those “morals” found in the Bible, that aren’t evident in life, in which we would staunchly disagree.

For example, my 10-year-old daughter is good friends with my gay friend’s adopted sons, and they play together pretty often. She notices that having two dads instead of a dad and a mom is unique because gay couples are a minority.

But here’s the thing…

She has never once considered the morality of her friends having two dads.

She hasn’t been indoctrinated with the idea that their lifestyle is a “sin.” Her default position, as an innocent, non-indoctrinated member of society, is that her friends have two dads instead of a mom and a dad.

That’s it.

This is because these two men are good fathers, outstanding citizens in our community, and would go out of their way to help us in any way they could.

There is no evidence to suggest that their lifestyle is harmful or affects our life negatively. You would need the Bible to come to that conclusion.

Alternatively, if my daughter and I were walking down the sidewalk and we witnessed an assault, she would know something wasn’t right. She would recognize that one human physically assaulting another was a problem.

Now granted, my gay friends don’t represent the entire homosexual community. My claim that they are good people is not a Texas Sharpshooter fallacy. I’m well aware that there are both moral and immoral members of any sect.

My point is that morality is independent of sexuality outside of religion.

In the fashion of Martin Luther King Jr., I have a dream that members of the LGB community will one day live in a nation where they will not be judged by their sexuality, but by the content of their character.

During our meeting, I went on to say that the only reason there’s even a debate about LGB rights is because of religion.

If everyone were an atheist, the number of people opposed to LGB rights would greatly diminish.

Why do you think this is?

Because there isn’t any actual evidence to support the religious claims that your sexual identity has any bearing on your morality.

If everyone were atheists, we’d have people doing good and bad things. Some would be members of the LGB community and some wouldn’t.

Religion is the rope that has tied morality and sexuality together.

Steven Winberg once said,

“Religion is an insult to human dignity. With or without it 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.”

The intolerance for homosexuality, originating from people’s religion, is a prime example of “good people doing evil things.”

And yes, even if everyone became atheists, we’d still have bigots. Religion is not the source of intolerance for all people.

Some people are just terrible people.

However, if everyone became an atheist, it would eliminate a widely accepted justification for the negative thoughts and actions toward people of the LGB community. People would no longer be able to hide behind religion and their true colors would show.

Alternatively, I am convinced many religious people are genuinely good.

It would probably be a massive relief for them if God showed up and said, “All that gay stuff in the Bible is inaccurate, and I don’t care who you screw.”

Because then they could stop feeling guilty for having thoughts and feelings that contradict the Bible. Plus they could have interactions with LGB people without having to constantly block out the little nagging reminder that they’re a “sinner.”

But let’s face it….God showing up is highly unlikely to happen.

So, how do we determine what’s moral without religion?

Penn Jillette sums up morality outside of religion very nicely:

“The question I get asked by religious people all the time is, without God, what’s to stop me from raping all I want? And my answer is: I do rape all I want. And the amount I want is zero. And I do murder all I want, and the amount I want is zero. The fact that these people think that if they didn’t have this person watching over them that they would go on killing, raping rampages is the most self-damning thing I can imagine.”

Just a side note here…

If you do happen to be the type of person who would “go on killing, raping rampages” without your religion, then it’s probably best you keep on keepin’ on with whatever you believe.

And since we’re on the subject, do you know what book condones rape, killing, incest, and even slavery?

The Bible.

I wrote about this in more detail in my article, “Top 5 Problems With The Bible.”

In closing, I’d like to provide a summarized answer to the hypothetical question mentioned at the beginning of this article:

“Do you think an atheist and a preacher could come together and create rules of morality that they agreed on?”

I believe we could and my conditions would be as follows…

The rules of morality must be based on evidence from both the positive and negative impacts observed from both actions and the lack of actions committed by members of our society.

I’m confident that at least a few of the rules generated from this principle would coincide with the genuinely moral portions of the Bible, and that’s where we’d find our common ground.

So, where do I, an atheist, get morals? From evidence or lack thereof.