Good Without God? Nope!

Atheists like to claim that they can be "good without God". But the claim itself is self-refuting, since anti-theism presupposes theism. Atheism has no consistent moral standard, no basis on which to define "good". If atheism was rational and true, then we are just bundles of chemicals responding to our impulses; some have even said that rape is acceptable in an atheistic evolutionary worldview. And why not? One bundle of chemicals violating another bundle of chemicals, there is nothing wrong with that in this worldview.

Like any self-respecting Stalin, Hitler, Mao or any other totalitarian knows, go after the children and indoctrinate them in anti-God propaganda. This encourages distrust of parents and outright rebellion, which in turn causes a reliance on the atheistic whims of the State. A typical example of this tyranny can be seen in the latest efforts of the American Humanist Association.

So, goodness is defined by arbitrary standards, whims, convenience and sometimes by evolution (presupposing that evolution is true).

Atheists and Christians often debate such questions. In this case, the politician’s answer is true: it really does depend upon what you mean by ‘God’ and ‘without’.

In fact, atheists not only can, but must be (at least to some extent) good without believing in God—even if they hate God with every inch of their being. If they are really made in the image of God as the Bible teaches (Genesis 1:28), then that fact must have some results. They, like all of us, are fallen (as explained in Genesis 3), but even so must still have an in-built sense of the reality and the importance of right and wrong. The very fact that atheists routinely argue that this or that is moral or immoral, and that such matters are important, bespeaks that fact. Unless that were so then the Bible would start to look suspect. When society comes across someone who really does seem to have mostly wiped out the ideas of right and wrong from their mind, we label them as insane and lock them in padded cells. We don’t just say, ‘If that’s what you like, then we’ll respect your choice.

If atheists were generally able to throw off all the shackles of morality and live their lives consistently with atheism, we’d be worried. If they could consistently live out such ideas as, ‘We’re just here to pass on our selfish genes’, ‘Survival of the fittest’ or ‘Life is ultimately all without meaning or purpose’, it would put a serious question mark over the record given to us in Genesis. It would be evidence that maybe they weren’t creatures made by God after all, and that atheism might actually be true.

Read the rest of "Can we be good without God?", and you may like a follow-up article from an atheist who could not grasp the concept.