Ethics

Ethics [still] vs Scripture

Far from any religion, and especially Christianity, being essential to the development of a sound ethical sense, it is a destructive hindrance from whose influence all children, but especially those in our public schools, should be protected.

Prominent clerics in New South Wales are claiming that ethics which are not based on Christian teaching are somehow not proper. They are labouring under the delusion that ethics and religious belief are interdependent. In fact, religion is to ethics as pseudoscience is to science. In each case, the proselytisers of the former try to establish a right to make significant statements about the latter by presenting the latter as being somehow owned by the former.

In NSW, the anxious clerics are even going to the extent of insisting that they should have a prominent role in evaluating the ethics courses being tried out in ten schools because, as they falsely argue, ethics is a subset of religion.

In fact, far from the churches being allowed some role to play in the design or evaluation of ethics courses in schools, they should be not allowed within a bull’s roar of them.

Ethical and religious teachings are both concerned with how people should behave in particular situations and to this extent have a seeming similarity, but there are at least three ways in which they are starkly different and largely incompatible.

Objective:

Ethics concerns itself with how people should behave so as to secure the greatest possible well being of all human beings in this life. Religion concerns itself with how people should behave so as to secure the greatest possible well being for themselves in the next life. Ethics is about securing benefits for everyone in the one existence we know we all shall have; religion is about securing benefits for yourself in a future existence that many (maybe most) do not even think will happen.

Methodology:

Ethical conclusions are reached from rational analysis of the effects on everybody concerned of all available ways of behaving. Religious conclusions, certainly Christian ones, are handed out by influential human beings who claim that they know the wishes of a god. In making an ethical judgment, people have to work out the course of action that will minimise the total amount of personal discomfort in the world. In making a religious judgment, people have to work out what to do to avoid hell.

To be ethical, you have to open your mind and engage your brain. To be religious, you have to close your mind and open your ears. The hallmarks of ethical behaviour are intellectual engagement with issues and their consequences. The hallmarks of religious behaviour are unquestioning obedience to received articles of faith and to observance of rituals.

Continued…

Tags: Christianity, Education, Ethics

Sunday, July 4th, 2010 Christianity, Education, Ethics No Comments

Ethics vs Scripture

Ten Network’s ’7 PM Project’ bring Kitty Flannigan’s views on the teaching of ethics to Aussie school children – resisted feverishly by religious beneficiaries.

“Ethics should not be offered as an alternative to the Bible” – Anglican Archbishop of Sydney, Peter Jensen — Circa 2010

“If any one comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.”
- Jesus (Luke 14:26)

“I have wiped out many nations, devastating their fortress walls and towers. Their cities are now deserted; their streets are in silent ruin. There are no survivors to even tell what happened. I thought, ‘Surely they will have reverence for me now! Surely they will listen to my warnings, so I won’t need to strike again.’ But no; however much I punish them, they continue their evil practices from dawn till dusk and dusk till dawn.” So now the LORD says: “Be patient; the time is coming soon when I will stand up and accuse these evil nations. For it is my decision to gather together the kingdoms of the earth and pour out my fiercest anger and fury on them. All the earth will be devoured by the fire of my jealousy. “On that day I will purify the lips of all people, so that everyone will be able to worship the LORD together. My scattered people who live beyond the rivers of Ethiopia will come to present their offerings.”

- God (Zephaniah 3:6-10 NLT)

http://atheistage.org/?p=3312

Tags: Christianity, Education, Ethics

Monday, June 28th, 2010 Christianity, Education, Ethics, Video No Comments

No ethics in school say Christians – What would Jesus do?

“Ethics should not be offered as an alternative to the Bible” - Anglican Archbishop of Sydney, Peter Jensen – Circa 2010

If any one comes to me and does not hate his own father and mother and wife and children
and brothers and sisters, yes, and even his own life, he cannot be my disciple.
- Jesus (Luke 14:26) – Circa 1-3 BCE

I have wiped out many nations, devastating their fortress walls and towers. Their cities are now deserted; their streets are in silent ruin. There are no survivors to even tell what happened. I thought, ‘Surely they will have reverence for me now! Surely they will listen to my warnings, so I won’t need to strike again.’ But no; however much I punish them, they continue their evil practices from dawn till dusk and dusk till dawn.” So now the LORD says: “Be patient; the time is coming soon when I will stand up and accuse these evil nations. For it is my decision to gather together the kingdoms of the earth and pour out my fiercest anger and fury on them. All the earth will be devoured by the fire of my jealousy. ”On that day I will purify the lips of all people, so that everyone will be able to worship the LORD together. My scattered people who live beyond the rivers of Ethiopia will come to present their offerings.

- Gawd (Zephaniah 3:6-10 NLT)

In what appears to be a concerted effort to keep its hallowed patch in the NSW education curriculum, the forces of the Anglican and Catholic Churches and the NSW Christian Democratic Party are using their influence to scuttle a planned trail of ethics teaching in NSW schools.

The initial plan is to implement ethics teaching classes as an alternative to scripture lessons. The trial is marked for years five and six students in just ten state primary schools for a two-term period only. Even so, this ‘toe in the water’ approach would be the first time in more than 100 years that the NSW state government had approved the teaching of ethics in schools as an alternative to religious education. The program has been developed by the St James Ethics Centre and supported by the Federation of Parents & Citizens Associations.

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The plan was initially approved by previous State Premier Nathan Rees shortly before his ousting in favour of current Premier Kristina Keneally. Keneally is a self-declared ‘Catholic feminist’ and was the president of students at American Catholic Universities.

She has reportedly been the subject of particularly strong lobbying from Anglican Archbishop of Sydney, Peter Jensen, who suggested, according to the Herald, that “the permanent introduction of secular ethics classes in public schools … would jeopardise the future of religious education”.

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Meanwhile, the Rev Fred Nile, leader of the Christian Democratic Party, said (again, according to the Herald) that “the trial should be postponed pending further consultations with all church leaders. He said the trial was being advertised for all children in the trial schools in direct competition with the legal approved scripture classes, contradicting earlier assurances the classes were only for children opting out of scripture classes.”

This campaign has been in the wake of some extremely vitriolic Easter sermons by Jensen and Catholic Cardinal Pell against the rise of atheism.

Full story here

“You Ethiopians will also be slaughtered by my sword,” says the LORD. And the LORD will strike the lands of the north with his fist. He will destroy Assyria and make its great capital, Nineveh, a desolate wasteland, parched like a desert. The city that once was so proud will become a pasture for sheep and cattle. All sorts of wild animals will settle there. Owls of many kinds will live among the ruins of its palaces, hooting from the gaping windows. Rubble will block all the doorways, and the cedar paneling will lie open to the wind and weather. This is the fate of that boisterous city, once so secure. ”In all the world there is no city as great as I,” it boasted. But now, look how it has become an utter ruin, a place where animals live! Everyone passing that way will laugh in derision or shake a defiant fist.

Gawd – (Zephaniah 2:12-15 NLT)

“If a man abide not in me, he is cast forth as a branch, and is withered; and men gather them, and cast them into the fire, and they are burned.“

- Jesus (John 15:6 KJV) Circa 1-3 BCE

So it shall be at the end of the world; the angels shall come forth, and sever the wicked from among the just. And shall cast them into the furnace of fire; there shall be a wailing and gnashing of teeth.

- Jesus (Matthew 13:49-50) Circa 1-3 BCE

Tags: Christianity, Church/State, Education, Ethics, Morality

Tuesday, April 20th, 2010 Christianity, Church/State, Education, Society 1 Comment

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