Good without God is the ambiguous part-title to this interesting editorial article on atheism and religion in the Guardian 15/7/19 (The Guardian view on atheism):
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/jul/15/the-guardian-view-on-atheism-good-without-god
Not sure if they mean it’s good to be without God or you can be good without God or? There appears to be an implicit sense of concern in the article and I wonder if Quakers, nontheist or otherwise, have the answers?
I note that, for Britain, citing the British Social Attitudes Survey: “Even among the over-75s, only a third identify as Anglican. More than half of British people now say that they have no religion; about two-fifths are Christians of one sort of another; 9% are Muslims.”
… and there is the rub Trevor: they say only 1% of young people are church members of some kind. How do they test whatever it is they call morality, “good” behaviour?
They do not have the principles of a religious outlook if not a belief and their only cultural education is a diluted socialism (not the full blooded Fabian vision). For them the end justifies the means and so lying and deceit are justifiable modes.
In Friendship
Malcolm (Mike) Bell Weetwood Leeds
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Thanks Mike
What with Brexit, have been thinking of you recently.
When you say “For them the end justifies the means and so lying and deceit are justifiable modes.” who is ‘them’?
You can’t mean the 99% of young people who are not church members?
That would be too sweeping a generalisation. What about the 9% Moslems?
I’m reading ‘Clear Bright Future: A radical defence of the Human Being’ by Paul Mason at present (his latest book 2019). You will know of him I’m sure.
If he’s right, a large percentage (born since 1979 so that’s upto age 40) will be (unwittingly) absorbed in the morality and practices of ‘neoliberal’ capitalism (the kind with the ‘unacceptable face’) – and so lying and deceit perhaps.
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