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OUR SIMILARITIES, DIFFERENCES AND MORALITY
Talk at First Unitarian Church, April 22, 2001
Harry Greenberger

A few months ago, I was invited to address a group of ACLU supporters on the subject of evolutionism vs creationism. The fact that I am not a biologist, anthropologist nor geologist did not prevent me from accepting, but I advised them that I would give my "breakfast table" talk on the subject--that means "just among us nonprofessionals." When I was offered the opportunity to talk to your Unitarian group, without a degree in Philosophy Theology nor other erudite field, I again accepted and will give you my breakfast table talk about the similarities and differences of and between our two organizations, and a bit on morality.

Presently, this country is being inundated by a flood of religiosity and many of the radical right religious leaders have demonized Secular Humanism as the voice of Satan, leading many who otherwise would claim it, reluctant to do so. A new book "Mindsiege: the Battle for Truth in the New Millennium," is a call to arms of evangelical Christians against secular humanism. The main theses are: (a) that secular humanism is a "religion;" (b) that the secular humanist ideology dominates all of the major institutions of American life--including the ACLU, NOW, NEA, the National Association of Biology Teachers, the major TV networks, the major foundations (Ford, Rockefeller, etc.) the National Council of Churches, the liberal wing of the Democratic Party, the UN, UNESCO, Harvard, Yale, and 2,000 other colleges and universities; (c) that secular humanists have " undermined the moral fabric of America"; (d) that evangelical Christians (80,000,000 strong) need to gear up for an all-out battle to root secular humanists out of public life; and (e)( that the bottom line is: "No humanist is fit to hold office."

When advised that your pastor was to talk about Secular Humanism in January, I attended your services and became reassured that when I returned, I would be speaking to a friendly group. In fact, I listened to Guy Lamothe's talk, with pen & paper in hand to make notes of my points of disagreement, and at the end of his talk, had made no notes. I will, however mention some of the apparent differences as well as my views of some of the areas of common ground, between this group and our New Orleans Secular Humanist Assn.

When I compare the "Principles of Humanism" with the "Statement of Principle" in your hymnal, I find that they are almost interchangeable, and my reading of some of your literature suggest to me that there is little difference between being a Unitarian and a Humanist. One difference may be described in a brochure from the American Humanist Association, which states: "Humanism finds freedom from religiously inspired guilt and related punitive attitudes to be a prerequisite for hapiness and living the good life. . . and find this freedom through the recognition that there are unsufficient grounds. . . and need . . .for belief in life after death or universal laws of reward and punishment. In 1877, William Clifford wrote in his manifesto, "The Ethics of Belief," "It is wrong, always, everywhere, and for anyone, to believe anything upon insufficent evidence." It is we humans--not gods or gurus, not demigods or demagogues--who give substance to this life. Our New Orleans group are Secular Humanists, which means that we attribute nothing to the supernatural.

Another of our differences, it seems to me, regards holidays and rituals. In one of your pamphlets you discuss rites and holidays, and explain why you celebrate Christmas, Easter, Channukah and other traditional religious holidays, recognizing religious festivals as "innate and needful in all human cultures," Secular Humanists, while possibly decorating for the Christmas season and exchanging gifts, generally frown upon celebration of religious events, which gives encouragement to those whom we feel are misled in such religious beliefs. We regret our lack of rituals, such as you practice here, and of celebratory dates, but consider that one of the costs of being non-believers.

There is a recent movement among non-believers, scientists and rationalists to bring attention to the importance of scientific thinking, by the commemoration of Charles Darwin's birthday in February. Our group was the lead sponsor of such an event last year, held at Tulane University's Biology Department. This year, we had a full day of video presentations and talks by professors from five universities for Darwin Day at UNO. We have thus created at least one day for celebration and this year garnered a favorable article in the Times Picayune, albeit on the Religion page.

Another difference between our groups, while both of us provide an opportunity for like-minded people to enjoy each others company, with no "pastor" nor rituals, we are more likely to invite outside speakers to our meetings and to make the education of the public one of our primary missions. In the short time that our New Orleans group has been organized, we have entertained speakers on such subjects as women's right to choose, death with dignity, decriminalization of marijuana, bases of morality and ethics, an ex-priest's praise for Humanism, right to privacy, history of book burning, Bush administration church/state issues, the future of the family, and most recently we hosted a meeting with Faye Girsh, President of The Hemlock Society, as speaker. Her topic was Physician assisted dying as a humanitarian act.

To get our name known locally, one of our projects is to supply volunteers for WYES-TV for their on-air membership drives, where they allow our banner to be shown and they describe the nature of our organization. To get our position known to the general public, our members have appeared on two local television "issue" programs, representing our side of the church/state separation issue. Our Biology professor member was invited by the Tulane Philosophy Society to debate Evolution vs Creationism. With constant encouragement, our members write and often get published, letters to the editor at the Times Picayune. Our Darwin Day event received serious Times Picayune coverage. We were invited to be co-sponsors with ACLU and others of the debate on President Bush's Faith Based federal funding, taking place a Loyola law school, with the public invited.

An important matter which I assume we both struggle to understand and to explain is the question of morality, without attribution to the "word of God." For most of those who accept the supernatural as the arbiter of right and wrong, all others who do not are considered to be amoral, anything goes, relativists, with no basis for our behavior. Interestingly, a study by Public Agenda, a secular, non-partisan think tank, reports that 58% of respondents said it was not necessary to believe in God to have good values. I can recommend reading a book "Godless Morality (Keeping religion out of ethics)" by Richard Holloway, Bishop of Edinburgh and Professor of Divinity in the City of London, in which he writes, "I have claimed that morality is a human construct; it is something that we ourselves have created. This may seem too obvious to be disputed, until we remember that many of our moral traditions claim to be the mind and command of God."

Still public figures, especially politicians, feel safe making the assumption that being religious is somehow better (more virtuous and more moral) than not being religious. In an article by James Underdown, who heads up the Center for Inquiry-West, he wrote: "Statistically, atheists and agnostics are more likely to have a college degree, and are underrepresented in prisons and in divorce court. I have a file full of newspaper clippings about religious believers doing horrible things to people, and history books full of murder and mayhem from the hands of the faithful. In my personal experience, secular humanists are at least as honest, compassionate, and law-abiding as any other large group--probably more so." A writer in the Journal for Scientific Study of Religion, refers to a Lawrence Kohlberg study "Stages of moral development as basis for moral education," which makes it "clear that moral and religious development are quite separate, and that the two should not be confused. He has suggested that it is a fallacy to think that basic moral principles are dependent upon a particular religion, or any religion at all. "We have found no important differences in development of moral thinking between Catholics, Protestants, Jews, Buddhists, Moslems and atheists." Incidentally, a recent survey by Money Magazine found that 40% of participants said they would consider cheating on their tax returns. Could they have all been immoral Secular Humanists?

So what is the source of our "morality?" The current issue of Free Inquiry, the quarterly publication of the Council for Secular Humanism, is devoted to the questions: Is Philosophy obsolete? Is emerging science answering philosophers greatest questions? One contributor to the issue wrote: "Surely planet earth and its inhabitants can have little to do with the ultimate nature of reality. Any purpose we might find for our existence will have to be self-generated, a task that I see as neither impossible nor fruitless." I do not have a degree in Philosophy, and don't understand much of what they write on this subject, but I will share with you my "breakfast table" views. I like what Albert Einstein, in l94l, wrote: "In their struggle for the ethical good, teachers of religion must have the stature to give up the doctrine of a personal God, that is give up that source of fear and hope which in the past placed such vast power in the hands of priests. In their labors they will have to avail themselves of those forces which are capable of cultivating the Good, the True, and the Beautiful in humanity itself. That is, to be sure, a more difficult task but an incomparably more worthy task."

The assertion that without God we would feel free to kill and steal and sleep with anyone because we could not possibly find a reason not to, is absurd. We have an instinctive interest in preservation of ourselves, of our kin, of our community and our culture. Peace, health and stability are essential to that preservation, and the common sense guidelines that lead to that, form the bedrock of a strong moral system. In the search to understand what we think we know and believe to be true, cognitive psychologists, linguists, anthropologists and philosophers joined in an interdisciplinary effort that became known as cognitive science -- now even refined into cognitive neuroscience. There is a new field called "neuro-theology" which concludes that spiritual experiences are the inevitable outcome of brain wiring--that the human brain has been genetically wired to encourage religious beliefs. They also propose that rituals tend to focus the mind, blocking out sensory perceptions--including those that the orientation area uses to figure out the boundaries of the self. That's why even non-believers are often moved by religious ritual, they conclude. It appears that we secularists are more likely to override these brain connections than most others.

These studies of the mind, the brain and genome makeup, support a strong genetic component of the human behavior and attitudes. But environmental experiences are still accepted as shaping the genetic predispositions into the persons we become. Early childhood experience, unrecalled consciously, have such indelible effect on our thinking, that they become almost impossible to reverse. Not only religious indoctrination, but "morality" learned by word and deed of parents and others, remain as permanent parts of adult behavior. I believe that that is where most individual concepts of right and wrong originate. But, that does not explain how these concepts came to be in our parents and their parents. It is the opinion of many philosophers, with whom I agree, a system of morals can be developed without divine decree. From The Atheists' Handbook, I quote: "What, if anything compels good behavior in a Materialist? The answer is Self-preservation and the realization that this life is the only one there is. By self-preservation, I mean that the genuine Materialist understands that any irresponsible actions on his part ultimately undermine his own personal security. If he abuses others in any way, he undermines the social fabric within his community, making it more probable that he will be abused at some time." Sounds like the Golden Rule, although I prefer the older Confucian version: Don't do to others what you would not have them do to you. That book continues: "It is important to understand three things: (1) this ethic excludes supernatural postulates from consideration; (2) the values derived are demonstrated to be objectively testable and efficacious in promoting good, and (3) they are subject to change or evolve as conditions on the planet change."

Our Declaration of Independence proclaims: "We hold these truths to be self evident." A self-evident truth is one that is such that if you understand it, you are justified in believing it. An article in Free Inquiry magazine entitled "Is morality a matter of taste?" includes ". . . are there any self-evident truths in morality? Consider the statement, 'Unnecessary suffering is wrong." This statement does not say that suffering is wrong or that no one has suffered unnecessarily. What it says is that whenever one is made to suffer unnecessarily, a wrong has been committed. To anyone who understands what suffering and wrong are, this statement should be self-evident."

In a pamphlet entitled: "A New Global Ethics" the Council for Secular Humanism writes: There are. . . basic moral decencies that are commonly recognized as binding in virtually all civilized communities of the world. These ethical principles embody the collective heritage of humankind. They have been tested in the crucible of human experience by their consequences for human good. They include the need to be truthful, to keep our promises, to be sincere, honest, loyal and dependable, to act with good will, to forbear from injuring other persons or their property; to be beneficent, compassionate, and fair; to show gratitude; to be just, tolerant and cooperative, and to use peaceful methods to negotiate differences. My view is that Unitarians and Secular Humanists, individually, must continue to resolve and define the sources of our morality and to share our findings with others. There also may be ways in which our two groups may engage in joint activities and sponsorships.

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