Morality is an inherently Theistic concept. It's an inescapable fact, you cannot have a moral law if you do not have a moral law giver. When you remove that moral law giver, you have two options. You can become the moral law giver, or you can live (or die) as an anarchist.
The latter is a troublesome conclusion for atheists. Some of them, sadly, do take their view to this logical conclusion, but generally speaking, you won't find many atheists who completely discard morality, as their worldview requires. In fact, ironically, a large portion of their complaints against "religion" are moral objections. But if you don't have a moral source, how do you judge moral beliefs?
If you're a Christian, you already know the answer. One day, all people, regardless of their personal beliefs, will have to answer to the God who actually created them. Every failure to follow His will will be dealt with, whether we, ourselves, receive due penalty for our error, or we ultimately entrust our burden to the Lord upon the cross.
But try answering that question as an atheist. Why are evil things objectively evil? The key word there is "objectively". There is a difference between "it's wrong in my opinion" and "it's actually wrong". You can make an objective mistake, such as "1 + 1 = 5". But you cannot make a subjective mistake. What is the best ice cream flavor? There is no right or wrong answer! But most atheists prefer to think, speak, and act, as if there are right and wrong things to do. So, in this article, I will briefly, yet critically examine the most common ways atheists attempt to justify objective morality in a worldview which precludes a source thereof.
The pain principle
One way atheists try to justify morality is to assume pain is a bad thing, and argue that if a thing causes pain, it must be evil. However, pain and evil do not always correspond. In fact, sometimes the opposite is the case. If there truly is no afterlife, then the dead can feel no pain. Thus, if you kill someone, and especially if you find a painless way to do it, you have ended their pain. By contrast, if you conceive a child, you have created a brand new receptacle of pain. Not to mention the pain common in childbirth. So, if we take the pain principle consistently, one of the most evil things you can do is save (or create) a life, and one of the most good things you can do is commit mass genocide. This, of course, is the reverse of the known moral order. Thus, the pain principle cannot logically be a standard of morality.
Because I don't like them.
Almost as if admitting morality is subjective in their worldview, many atheists put a lot of stock into their own personal opinions, arguing that if they don't like something, it's evil, whereas if they do like it, it's ok. Because this logic is subjective, it cannot be universally applied. Only if there's an objective moral standard that applies to all people, at all times, regardless of their personal beliefs and desires, can you truly say "that was good" or "that was evil". Arguing that someone else's actions are evil because you don't like them is like saying no one can drink cranberry juice because I completely despise it.
Most people/society agree they're evil.
An extension of the personal standard is the societal standard. This is really just another variation of "I don't like it", but with a few other problems, starting with defining the sample group. "Society" is ambiguous, localised, and shifting. Of course, atheists are more likely to resonate with the general moral views of societies in which atheism is permitted to thrive. But it is illogical to define "society" as "the portion of society that tends to agree with me". Of course, assuming such things even exist. If you're one of the few atheists in Saudi Arabia, for example, you're probably not going to win many popularity contests. Furthermore, as is proven by the fact atheism is a historical minority that has only recently become popular, society shifts, both naturally, and intentionally. Society cannot be a standard of objective morality because it won't sit still for long enough.
Because they're illegal
Often, you'll find atheists arguing based on the law. If you run around stealing, murdering, raping etc., you'll probably get arrested. But this is yet another inconsistent standard, and also one that is regularly criticised. It's inconsistent because different regions have different laws (or even no laws at all). But it also receives justified criticism because the law can be wrong. It was illegal to protect Jews in Nazi Germany. It's illegal for a woman to not wear a burqa in Iran. It's illegal for a native born Malaysian citizen to leave Islam. These laws are all objectively evil, and yet, they existed in the past, and some of them may even exist when you read this article. In your own country, you must obey the laws you don't agree with, too. What happens if you don't? You're punished by the brute strength of law enforcement. Therein lies the problem. It's not about who is right, but who has the biggest gun. I don't especially want to live in a world where "you have to kill that Jew, it's the law" is considered a valid argument. Neither should you.
There are consequences for doing them
Similar to "it's the law of the land" is "it's the law of the jungle". That is, the law might not punish you, but your actions still have consequences. But even this is not necessarily true.
Consider, for example, Jack the Ripper. Jack the Ripper is long dead, yet we still don't know who s/he was. If atheism was true, Jack the Ripper would have gotten away with murder. So are we saying the standard is "don't get caught"? Because that doesn't seem just in the eyes of anyone. Therefore, consequences cannot be a logical standard of morality.
It's how we evolved
One of the most interesting examples of a supposed standard for morality in an atheistic worldview is the argument from Evolution. We hold our moral views according to how we
evolved, and they actually contributed to our Evolution. They kept us alive in the past, and they will keep us alive in the future. The problem with this is that all this amounts to is an explanation for why we hold subjective opinions. Subjective morality is still subjective morality, no matter how it came about. "You can't do that because I've evolved to think it's wrong" could justifiably be met with the sarcastic response of "I've evolved to think it's right". On top of that, in order to use Evolution to justify morality, one must first assume Evolution is true, or even remotely valid, which of course it is not. You can no more convince a non-Evolutionist to follow Evolutionary morality than one can convince a non-Christian to follow Christian morality. The only way to do this is to keep them mentally separate, which of course is why atheists do tend to prefer, and selectively hold to, Christian morality.
We have benefited from following these moral systems
A less common response is to point out that while morality is subjective in atheistic worldviews, we benefit from maintaining these moral values, and thus we should continue promoting them. This is ironic, as it effectively promotes selfish motives for maintaining unselfish moral values. It really highlights the heart of those who argue this way.
Selfishness, however, could not create selfless moral values such as "love your neighbor as you love yourself", or "love your enemies, pray for those who spitefully use you". Even "do unto others as you would have them do to you" (as opposed to the more common secular version "don't do to others what you wouldn't want them to do to you") is inherently non-selfish, and thus selfishness cannot be its foundation.
Furthermore, "we have benefited from it" is actually an excellent argument for excessive immorality, such as the Holocaust. As evil as it was, we have benefitted from advancements brought about as a direct result of it. The scariest thing about this fact is that because of these benefits, some even question whether the Holocaust was truly evil. Thus, if anything, this particular standard is proof that atheism erodes morality, not that it provides us a foundation for it.
Animals behave this way...
When we hear the phrase "you're acting like an animal", we typically understand that it is supposed to be an insult. However, some atheists selectively apply animalistic morals to human society. This is particularly the case with homosexuality, but it is occasionally applied to other animalistic behaviors, too. For example, I once debated an Evolutionist who argued that we should care for the elderly because studies show elephants do likewise. However, no one who uses this argument is consistent with it, simply because there is no animal in the world that lives by human morals. Every species behaves in a way that would get them arrested if they were human. Thus, it's more logical to say "this is a good thing, therefore we approve when animals do it" than "animals do it, therefore it is a good thing we should approve of". That is, unless you believe we should rape like ducks, war like chimps, torture like coyotes, or kill a rival's children like lions. The animal kingdom is brutal, and our moral distinction from it is proof of our spiritual distinction from it.
Conclusion
In spite of all their excuses, atheism has no objective basis for morality. It's all opinion vs. opinion, and the opinion that wins is the one that can be enforced by brute strength. In other words, in atheism, the one who is right is the one with the biggest gun. Now that we've established that atheism leads to the absurd conclusion that good and evil don't actually exist, let's talk about Jesus.
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