Can Atheists Justify Being Good Without God? Atheists fail to make an important distinction. One can be good (as many atheists are) without believing in God. But one cannot be good without there being a God. That is, they can believe in a moral law (and live accordingly) without believing in God. But they cannot justify this belief without reference to a Moral Law Giver (God)... The fact is, that you cannot have an objective moral law without a Moral Law Giver. But atheists are the first to insist there must be a moral law–otherwise, how can they mount their argument against God from the injustices in this world. C. S. Lewis said this clearly when he wrote, “[As an atheist] my argument against God was that the universe seemed so cruel and unjust. But how had I got this idea of just and unjust? A man does not call a line crooked unless he has some idea of a straight line” (Mere Christianity, 15). Thus, he reasoned from this objective moral law to a Moral Law Giver (God). The atheist must make his painful choice: Either he loses the basis for his argument against God from evil, or he must admit there is an objective moral law which leads to a Moral Law Giver. One thing is certain: without God, the atheist cannot have objective goodness for goodness sake. Indeed, since “for goodness sake” is a euphemistic phrase meaning “For God’s sake,” then the atheist ad, both literarily and logically, should be rendered, “Why believe in God? Just be good for God’s sake.” In other words, it is precisely because there is a God that we can really be good. Without an absolutely good God, there is no real objective basis for being good. normangeisler/articles/Atheism/CanAtheistsBeingGoodWithoutGod.htm
Posted on: Tue, 11 Mar 2014 20:19:30 +0000
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