Does Morality Depend On Religion?

Does Morality Depend on Religion?

4.1 The Presumed Connection between Morality and Religion

* Separation of Church and State

- Roy Moore and the ACLU

* Priests and ministers as moral experts

* Belief that morality can only be understood through religion

* Religion associated with morals while atheism is not

- Bertrand Russell

4.2 The Divine Command Theory

* Implies that morality is arbitrary

* Act is obligatory if and only if, and because, it is commanded by God

* Honesty and humility is right

* Child abuse and murder is wrong

* Recognizing it and making it

* Does God make the moral truths true or does he merely recognize them

4.3 The Theory of Natural Law

* Everything in nature has a purpose

- Aristotle originated this theory

- Revised by Christian philosophers (Saint Augustine, Saint Thomas)

* How things are and how they ought to be

- When something is serving it's purpose it is right, when it is defecting from that purpose it is wrong

- Beneficence and Deviance

* How do we determine what is right and wrong

- Dictated by reason

- Believers and nonbelievers both have ability to reason

- Moral decision making based on reason does not necessarily involve religion at all

- "Believers and nonbelievers inhabit the same moral universe"

4.4 Religion and Particular Moral issues

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