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BBC: Humanism

If we must have "Thought for the Day", it should not necessarily be any old thought. Perhaps a good slot would be a discussion of one of the moral issues of the day. In its present form, it seems to be assumed by the BBC that it must be a god slot, reflecting what many churchmen tell us on "Thought for the Day", that only belief in god provides a basis for morality. This argument does not stand up. Different gods promote very different moral values. The Greek gods were not exactly moral role models, but on the other hand they were interesting and sometimes fun, and did not encourage or command their worshippers to proselytise. The Old Testament Jehovah is a very unpleasant, tyrannical and cruel god. Judeo-Christian and Muslim gods have at different times commanded their followers to massacre Midianites and abduct their women, stone prostitutes and adulteresses, and slay heretics and infidels. At other times they have inspired their followers to shoot up abortion clinics, hunt down Salman Rushdie and crash aeroplanes into skyscrapers. Christians, who take their inspiration from the Sermon on the Mount, a splendid moral text, do not acknowledge a god who issues such commandments. The god they worship is a god of love. Likewise, moderate Muslims disown passages of the Koran that incite people to murder or commit cruel acts, and tell us that his commands have been misconstrued because the true Allah is a merciful, tolerant and humane god. What both are saying is that to be a proper god, to qualify as the god they worship, he—there is no question of she—must be a god who cannot require worshippers to commit evil acts. There is therefore a standard of goodness by which god is judged. The Old Testament god, Jehovah, fails the test and is not the true god. The New Testament god, the father of Jesus and Jesus himself, passes the test. Believers apply a standard of goodness independent of god. You do not obey or worship god just because he is god or is a god of authority, but because in your view he is good, and if he was not, you would not. It follows inexorably that there is no need for god as a basis for morality and we can leave him out of it. It also follows that humanists, who do not believe in a god, have as much right to have a say in a slot about morality as believers.