Feb 7

Episode 10: Christianity – The Container for Western Values

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The target audience for this video is the hundreds of millions of people who don’t quite believe the whole bible, but yet consider propagating Christianity nonetheless because of its value as a set of moral guidelines.

All creative assets used under fair use.

Music Credits:
Opening and Closing: Bitter Sweet Symphony, by The Verve
Yoga Nidra, by Meditation Spa
Meditation, by Relaxing Piano Music Consort
One, by Metallica, played by a tribute band
Meditation Spa Canon, by Meditation Spa

Richard Dawkins video at the end: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zSYosM2ZhzY

Transcript:
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Many Americans use Christianity as a way to teach very positive modern values to their children.   In this video i will address the following question.  Is religion good or harmful when used in this way? 

 [The majority of the story in this video took place in the late 1990's and I have no remaining legal obligations based upon these events.] 

In his recent book Beyond Religion the Dalai Lama proposed that religion based ethics are no longer sufficient for our modern world because we are too diverse too connected and our weapons too powerful for us to go on living by “revealed” moral codes that conflict with one another.  He proposed that we develop a common set of secular ethics that everyone can agree upon.  In the beginning of the book he said that if internal values are like water then religion is like tea.  And while no-one needs any specific type of tea, we all need water.  His opinion is that religion, like tea, bears other benefits that you would not get from inner values alone (such as sweetness, and good feeling), but that we really only need the inner values (or the water). 

For the record, I do not agree with his holiness on this matter.  He neglects to mention that religion, like tea, bears harmful traits. 

I look at modern Christianity as a container for western values.  As western values evolve, they are often attributed to Christianity.  So what about our question?  Is christianity good when used as a vehicle to teach modern values to children?   Absolutely not.  The problem with using faith based religion to teach inner values is the problem of false association.  When a child’s inner values are tied to a belief system that he later finds to be false, he has potential to throw out the baby with the bath water.  Meaning, when he ditches his faith, he ditches his inner values along with it.  I know that this is possible because I did it myself.  

I grew up in an extreme religious environment.  In fact, I went to private, Pentecostal, Christian schools from K-11th grade.  I was raised to believe that morals can only come from God, and to hell with it all if you don’t believe in Jesus.  When I got to college, I quickly realized that my parents were wrong about a great deal of things – especially religion.  The same people who taught me that it was wrong to lie, cheat and steal, had also taught me that non-Christians were bad people, that the earth was 6K years old, that witchcraft was a real problem, and many other false beliefs that were to be held in equal importance to the morals.  After I de-converted, I was a 19 year old kid with no way to discern which values were important and which were BS.  My moral compass had been shattered.  And over the next few years, I transformed into a bad person.  I started smoking.  I drank – a lot.  I started to lie and cheat on tests.  I started taking drugs and selling drugs.  I went into debt and completely ruined my credit.  I totaled my car and later totaled my motorcycle.  I somehow had the impression that committing minor crimes made me a stronger, better person.  So I did a lot of really stupid, petty crime.  I broke in to local stores and stole things that I didn’t need just for the fun of it.  I threw beer bottles through local business windows, and damaged bicycles that I would see chained to public bike racks.  One night I stole a fire extinguisher, and went through my apartment building spraying it through the mail slots in the front doors of the other apartments – making a huge mess for each of my neighbors.  Needless to say I damaged many of my friendships.  The list of additional transgressions is extensive.  During this period, I was the classic example of a bad person.  And I was proud of it.  That is how confused I was about right and wrong. On one occasion, the clerk at an auto repair shop accidentally gave me all my money back in addition to my change.  Instead of telling her and returning the money, I bragged to my father about my good fortune.  He told me that I should return the money – but I didn’t believe him.  I thought he was giving me more nonsensical, faith based advice.   Looking back, this was the darkest, most shameful part of my life.  It took me a solid five years to relearn the basic moral values of our society.  It is likely that I never would have re-adjusted if I hadn’t joined the military – where I learned the importance of basic morality in a secular setting.  At present day, I have long since considered myself fully recovered.   I obey the law, I work hard, I am compassionate to others, and I love my family.

The crux of my story is that I believe that all of this would have been completely avoidable if I had only learned to decouple morality from faith based beliefs.  Am i angry with my parents? No. They diligently taught me their values the best they knew how.  But they made a very common mistake.  They used Christianity as the exclusive delivery vehicle for the much needed inner values.

This is so important.  I cannot help but wonder how many murders, how many rapes, how many ruined lives were caused by otherwise good people – who’s religious upbringing left them confused about the nature of right and wrong and who took things just bit a too far before they found their way.