Saturday, February 28, 2009

Morality Play

The letter writer blamed "left-wing secularists" for the college shootings and advocated the favorite right-wing cureall, a return to "absolute, faith-based morals." Whose faith? Which morals? Those that generated the Inquisition and the Salem Witch Trials? Those that spawned the Taliban and the Ayatollahs? Who will serve as Arbiter of Faith and Morality?

The Conservative columnist noted "a major decline in morality as a direct consequence of a major decline in the influence of religious values." I agree; I, too, yearn for the bygone morality of our god-fearing forebears who exterminated Native Americans and enslaved Blacks, denied suffrage to women and exploited children-laborers in sweatshops, celebrated public lynchings, and burned witches at the stake. Gimme that ol'-time religion!

Is one moral if one behaves morally because of divine intimidation and threat?

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