Morality without religion
Dec. 27th, 2025 10:06 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
injunjaneIn our small local organization helping Ukrainian army there are many different people, but our leader, a very clever and energetic woman from Western Ukraine, seems to be rather rigid in terms of motivation and rules for our, I dare say, resistance against the global evil.
She likes to repeat three keystones of Ukrainian national idea - "Army, language, faith" (Армія, мова, віра).
While I'm very much for army and language, my relationship with faith is complicated, I stopped attending Orthodox church many years ago - and from the very start, I came there not to become indoctrinated, but to get some info about 'spiritual world', an area completely new for me at that time as a person from an atheistic family.
My parents, however, were not really hardcore atheists. They were indoctrinated soviet citizens, their high education was in the field of engineering and so, not really allowing them to understand complex matters such as evolution...no real knowledge of genetics convincing me the most because it was proclaimed a bourgeois science at their time, and too early for molecular biology to provide even more direct evidence.
I went to discover religion because their indoctrinated empty atheism seemed to me unconvincing and quite hypocritical.
It was an interesting experience which I'd prefer never to repeat.
My current point of view on religion is that brilliantly described by Prof. Neil deGrasse Tyson: religion satisfies the need of having emotional contact with the Universe, as an opposite to the intellectual contact provided by science.
I, actually, have a huge need for both types of contact and preferably without intermediares.
So, to the question of "faith" and whether I have a choice in my aspiration to avoid religion and still be a kind and decent person :) I talked to ChatGPT (it's naive but really helps me to collect and rationalize my thoughts), and the result is below.
Is it easier to teach morality directly?
Yes. Dramatically easier. And more honest.
Modern moral education works best when it focuses on:
- empathy (“How does this affect others?”)
- boundaries and consent
- responsibility for harm
- fairness and justice
- limiting aggression and abuse of power
These can be taught:
- without supernatural claims
- without fear or guilt
- without gender hierarchy
- without obedience to authority
Psychology, child development, and ethics all show that:
- moral behavior grows from emotional understanding, not rule memorization
- fear-based morality (“God will punish you”) is fragile
- authority-based morality breaks down when authority fails
So from a practical and ethical standpoint, direct moral teaching is superior.
Then why haven’t religions just done that?
Because morality is not the main thing religions historically existed for.
They also served to:
- create social cohesion
- legitimize power structures
- explain suffering
- enforce obedience
- preserve identity over generations
This requires:
- ritual
- myth
- authority
- hierarchy
Pure moral education does not require priests, temples, or gendered authority structure.
Morality does not require mystery, hierarchy, or ancient authority.
It requires empathy, responsibility, and limits on harm.
That insight is shared by:
- secular humanists
- moral philosophers
- many reform-minded believers
- most modern ethical frameworks
Religion becomes unnecessary for morality once people accept responsibility without outsourcing it to authority.
Meaning without myths
Meaning does not require cosmic purpose. It can be grounded in:
- relationships
- contribution to others
- curiosity and understanding
- creating and maintaining humane systems
This is often called existential or human-centered meaning:
“Life has meaning because conscious beings exist and can reduce suffering and increase flourishing.”
This framing:
- is compatible with science
- does not collapse when beliefs change
- does not depend on authority
She likes to repeat three keystones of Ukrainian national idea - "Army, language, faith" (Армія, мова, віра).
While I'm very much for army and language, my relationship with faith is complicated, I stopped attending Orthodox church many years ago - and from the very start, I came there not to become indoctrinated, but to get some info about 'spiritual world', an area completely new for me at that time as a person from an atheistic family.
My parents, however, were not really hardcore atheists. They were indoctrinated soviet citizens, their high education was in the field of engineering and so, not really allowing them to understand complex matters such as evolution...no real knowledge of genetics convincing me the most because it was proclaimed a bourgeois science at their time, and too early for molecular biology to provide even more direct evidence.
I went to discover religion because their indoctrinated empty atheism seemed to me unconvincing and quite hypocritical.
It was an interesting experience which I'd prefer never to repeat.
My current point of view on religion is that brilliantly described by Prof. Neil deGrasse Tyson: religion satisfies the need of having emotional contact with the Universe, as an opposite to the intellectual contact provided by science.
I, actually, have a huge need for both types of contact and preferably without intermediares.
So, to the question of "faith" and whether I have a choice in my aspiration to avoid religion and still be a kind and decent person :) I talked to ChatGPT (it's naive but really helps me to collect and rationalize my thoughts), and the result is below.
Is it easier to teach morality directly?
Yes. Dramatically easier. And more honest.
Modern moral education works best when it focuses on:
- empathy (“How does this affect others?”)
- boundaries and consent
- responsibility for harm
- fairness and justice
- limiting aggression and abuse of power
These can be taught:
- without supernatural claims
- without fear or guilt
- without gender hierarchy
- without obedience to authority
Psychology, child development, and ethics all show that:
- moral behavior grows from emotional understanding, not rule memorization
- fear-based morality (“God will punish you”) is fragile
- authority-based morality breaks down when authority fails
So from a practical and ethical standpoint, direct moral teaching is superior.
Then why haven’t religions just done that?
Because morality is not the main thing religions historically existed for.
They also served to:
- create social cohesion
- legitimize power structures
- explain suffering
- enforce obedience
- preserve identity over generations
This requires:
- ritual
- myth
- authority
- hierarchy
Pure moral education does not require priests, temples, or gendered authority structure.
Morality does not require mystery, hierarchy, or ancient authority.
It requires empathy, responsibility, and limits on harm.
That insight is shared by:
- secular humanists
- moral philosophers
- many reform-minded believers
- most modern ethical frameworks
Religion becomes unnecessary for morality once people accept responsibility without outsourcing it to authority.
Meaning without myths
Meaning does not require cosmic purpose. It can be grounded in:
- relationships
- contribution to others
- curiosity and understanding
- creating and maintaining humane systems
This is often called existential or human-centered meaning:
“Life has meaning because conscious beings exist and can reduce suffering and increase flourishing.”
This framing:
- is compatible with science
- does not collapse when beliefs change
- does not depend on authority
Thoughts
Date: 2025-12-28 01:51 am (UTC)Historically speaking, a flexible "cell" structure is favored in resistance movements. Leader-based ones have a vulnerability that if you take out the leader, they tend to collapse. But any resistance is useful.
>>She likes to repeat three keystones of Ukrainian national idea - "Army, language, faith" (Армія, мова, віра).<<
People desperately need a focus. But if you've only got one like that, you risk losing people who don't relate to it.
>>It was an interesting experience which I'd prefer never to repeat.<<
*laugh* I got curious about Sunday school when I was little. My parents let me try it out. I lasted a couple of weeks, and learned many more reasons why I am not a Christian.
>> Meaning does not require cosmic purpose. <<
That's true.
And yet, spirituality exists in all human societies. No society has managed to stamp it out completely, and some have tried really hard. You can suppress most of it, for a while, but not all of it and not forever. It respawns. What's interesting is that a lot of the same ideas and activities reappear. The details can be lost, but the core concepts seem to be hardwired into humanity, the universe, or both.
However, I agree that it would be useful to have moral frameworks that do not depend on religion, in the interest of pursuing a healthy society without constantly arguing over religious differences.
Re: Thoughts
Date: 2025-12-28 11:22 am (UTC)She's not too dogmatic, doing real things that help the cause is of much higher priority than complying to ideology
if I would start with Sunday school and as a kid, I wouldn't survive more than several days there. I don't remember, but my grandma told me that she wanted to baptize me when I was little, but I refused. Then, I came as a rebellious adolescent dissatisfied with adult people around me.
What saddens me the most, nobody proposed me an alternative, nobody told 'see, there are people who need organized religion and rituals, and people who need emotional contact with the whole world and explanation for their mystical experience, so think if this environment is really suitable for you'.
Instead, the attitude was 'you MUST do as we tell you, or burn in hell/loose eternal life. We know BETTER than anyone else'
It took me a lot of time (8+ years) and enormous inner fight to get out.
And yes, I still love Orthodox church chants :)
Re: Thoughts
Date: 2025-12-28 11:37 am (UTC)As for 'spirituality' (at least in the sense of deGrasse Tyson), I would leave it for sure but (1) give it alternatives (2) made it much less dogmatic (3) separated it as far away as possible from the state and hierarchy
I would definitely leave the church buildings and paintings (they're beautiful!) and some people to maintain them and keep order for donations - instead of turning churches to museums, - but would allow anyone to come and pass some time with their own personal contact with eternity.